Shackleton (2002– )

Ken Drury: Henry McNeish

Quotes 

• Sir Ernest Shackleton : What is going on here?

  Frank Worsley : McNish, here, feels that there's--

  Sir Ernest Shackleton : Get these men back to work, Captain. There's a base up ahead; Charlie's setting up a hooch tent. Now move, and that's an order.

  Henry McNish : You've no authority!

  Sir Ernest Shackleton : Don't talk to me about authority! Who gave you the authority to have 20 men standing still here freezing? Who gave you the authority to risk their lives while you discuss what you think?! You want to know WHY they're doing what they're doing? *Because I told them to.* If you think that's wrong, then you come to me!

  Henry McNish : The cutter's being torn apart!

  Sir Ernest Shackleton : I don't care about the bloody cutters! I care about the bloody MEN! THEIR LIVES! That's what I'm responsible for!

  Henry McNish : We'll, I'm responsible for my life now, and that means I don't have to accept what some bastard who plants flags in snow for a living thinks I should do!

  John Vincent : We haven't got a ship, we haven't got a contract. We don't have to do what you say.

  Sir Ernest Shackleton : I'm the leader of this expedition, and your contract is with me, not the bloody ship! Now you do what I say and I will keep you alive. And I *will keep you alive*! But if you threaten my expedition, the lives of my men, if you become the danger... then I will have no hesitation in having you shot.

• Henry McNish : Why do you stay out here, in the middle of bloody nowhere?

  Whaleman : To get away from up there. Whalemen not fit up there. People up there not like queer folk like whalemen around. We not can write poetry, we not can paint pictures...

  [unclear words] 

  Whaleman : . So... we come here. No damn use anywhere else.

  Henry McNish : [toasting]  : To those of us who are no damn use anywhere else!

  Everyone : No damn use anywhere else!

• [on repairing ice damage to the Endurance] 

  Henry McNish : I can make it waterproof, but no' iceproof.

• Sir Ernest Shackleton : Chippie... I suppose there's no way we could make the Caird more seaworthy without wood?

  Henry McNish : Who says we don't have wood? What do you want to do?

  Sir Ernest Shackleton : Make her unsinkable.

  Henry McNish : Cover her over, you mean? Like a deck?

  Sir Ernest Shackleton : Yes... but I suppose that's impossible.

  Henry McNish : Who's the carpenter around here, you or me?

• Sir Ernest Shackleton : Incredible, so beautiful. Imagine what people would say in London if one of them came floating up the Thames.

  Henry McNish : They'd say, "If there's an iceberg in London, what the bloody hell's happening to Scotland?"

• Henry McNish : Where are we now?

  Sir Ernest Shackleton : We're on South Georgia. But, unfortunately, the whaling station's on the other side of the island, and there's a mountain in between.

  Henry McNish : I knew you shouldn't've been allowed to read a compass on your own!