Everest: Eighty years of triumph and tragedy Book

A large format publication, with stunning colour photography, Everest--Eighty Years of Triumph and Tragedy recounts the stories of the men and women who have set out to conquer the world's most famous and forbidding mountain--one that forms part of the language with which we understand human courage and ambition. The book was first published in 1993 and the 2001 edition has been completely updated and now includes, amongst other reports, eye-witness accounts of the widely-publicised tragedy of 1996--when six climbers/clients from one of the new "commercial" expeditions were killed--and the discovery by a US expedition in 1999 of the frozen remains of George Mallory, lost for 75 years on the North Face. "As I sat next to him, I thought, this man was a fellow climber. We shared the same goals and aspirations, the same joys and sorrows. Our lives were motivated by the same elemental force. When I thought of what a valiant effort George had made ... I was flooded with a sense of awe." --Conrad Anker, part of the team that found Mallory. The book reflects on all the great historical conquests, most famously the triumphant "British" expedition of 1953--when New Zealand bee keeper Edmund Hillary and Indian/Nepalese co-climber Tenzing Norgay became the first men on the summit--but gives equal weight to those who tried and failed, mapping the challenge for those who came afterwards. For the most part, editor Peter Gillman lets the mountaineers tell their own stories--Mallory's intimate, touching letters home; the photographic self-portrait Bruce Herrod took on the summit on May 24, 1996, eleven months before his body and camera were found on the Hillary Step; Tenzing's final word on the great mystery of "who was first?". A fascinating exposition of why the mountain claims a unique space in both the physical and psychological geography of the planet. --Alex HankinRead More