Igor Alekseevich Zotikov – corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, polar explorer, glaciologist, who predicted the existence of subglacial Antarctic lakes, one of the discoverers of Lake Vostok. His name is well known to those interested in the history of the exploration of the Arctic and Antarctic. The book has an unusual structure. It was based on simple stories - by an American and a Russian - about life during the war and the first years after... Combined together in one book, these stories reinforced each other, suddenly creating a picture of the life of not two people, but the life of two countries during an important period of their history. And the American pilot Robert Dale and the Russian scientist Igor Zotikov met and became friends in Antarctica. The book ends with reproductions of paintings by I.A. Zotikov, who took an easel and paints on all expeditions and even in the Antarctic cold painted only from life.