Vertical Margins, by Reuben Ellis

Reuben Ellis explores the often troublesome connections between climbers and empire in Vertical Margins: Mountaineering and the Landscapes of Neoimperialism. Ellis uses the accounts of three modern-era expeditions by Halford Mackinder, Annie Smith Peck, and John Baptist Noel to probe the cultural baggage requisite for a mountain climb in a distant land. The author provides a focused analysis on the history of mountain writing in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, how it got tied into the genre of the exploration narrative, and how climbing a mountain gained nearly as much imperial significance as the more innately political exploration journey. Also important is the role representations of adventure, such as mountaineering books, played in shaping the culture they supposedly try to escape. This is intelligent writing, with plenty of room for grey areas and possibilities within Ellis' arguments, even while he presses the reader to follow him deeper into his line of thinking (a welcome contrast to Bayers' dogmatic Imperial Ascent). In the chapter on Mackinder, Ellis analyses Mackinder's only-recently published account of his ascent of Mount Kenya, the journey's connections to his academic career in geography as well as the overall history of the Royal Geographical Society. (He often references Cameron's To the Farthest Ends of the Earth.) For Peck, he hashes out her The Search for the Apex of America, about her attempts on Illampu and her ascent of Huascaran, discusses her writing about the economic development of South America (including in Apex), and the importance of her politics (including women's suffrage and support for Roosevelt) to her mission.

Regarding Everest, Ellis discusses the British imperial connections to the early Everest expeditions through John Noel's Through Tibet to Everest, as well as the research into the backroom politics of the expedition organizers done by Unsworth and Salkeld in Everest: The Mountaineering History. Ellis focuses on the filming of the 1922 and 1924 expeditions by Noel, and how the films played a pivotal role in both the promotion of the climbs and the ruining of the prospect of future climbs. He places the films in the context of the history of mountaineering photography, British filmmaking, and the sub-genre of adventure documentaries, noting the poor timing of the later film at the tail-end of the crash of British film in 1924. In addition, he shows the filming of the climbs as another form of geographical control---just as surveying and mapmaking define a location in terms of a particular culture. I found his analysis compelling, especially when placed against pretty good contextual research. I think you're going to like this one!

To the Top from Nowhere, by Vilane & Jennings

Sibusiso Vilane, with the help of Gail Jennings, tells of his becoming the first black African to climb Mount Everest in To the Top from Nowhere. Vilane grew up in South Africa and Swaziland, and progressed from herding goats and cows to attending school (and doing quite well) to eventually becoming a game ranger. He met John Doble when he volunteered to walk in the game reserve with him on his day off (and continued to do so), and his life has led a new course ever since. Doble was convinced that Vilane would make a good mountaineer and could even climb Everest, and he encouraged him, pulled strings for him, and sponsored him on his climbs, first to Kilimanjaro in 1999, then a Himalayan training regime in 2002, and then Everest in 2003. Vilane faced a sharp learning curve, with Kilimanjaro as his first experience at altitude, three trekking peaks as his next experience, and then Everest. He does well with the altitude, though the cold affects him greatly. Differences in culture play an important role in his narrative, as he is not used to sharing a tent, eating most of the foods available to him, using a computer, or being the object of a great deal of attention due to his skin color. Additionally, money is consistently a concern for him, especially during his first Everest trip, as he has very little to spend, and is fortunate in the kindness of others for things such as calling home.

Vilane actually makes two trips to Everest, first from Nepal via the Southeast Ridge in the spring of 2003, and again from Tibet via the North Ridge in the spring of 2005. Both times, he uses Jagged Globe for his climb, first as a member of a guided expedition, and then as an outfitter for his trip from the north. He climbs to the top in 2003 under the leadership of Robert Mads Anderson. (See his Summits: Climbing the Seven Summits Solo for his several earlier attempts on Everest.) For his return trip, he invites Sir Ranulph Fiennes (I really enjoyed his To the Ends of the Earth, about his transpolar circumnavigation of the earth.) to climb with him to raise money for three African charities. A few other South Africans join them. Vilane, three teammates and two Sherpa make the summit in an initial attempt, but Vilane faces a harrowing descent. Fiennes turns around at 8400 meters in a second party due to a feared heart attack. Since the publication of his book, Vilane has moved on to complete the Seven Summits, as well as trek to both the North Pole and the South Pole.

Mountain Madness, by Robert Birkby

Robert Birkby writes about the man behind the image in Mountain Madness: Scott Fischer, Mount Everest & A Life Lived on High. Birkby, both a friend and client of Scott Fischer, gives a balanced view, detailing his life and climbs, including his childhood, his family, his major climbs, and several commercial trips, including a few that included the author. He shows Fischer to be an exuberant, driven climber fostered in the NOLS program who had a special attraction to Mount Everest. Though ambitious, Fischer's love of climbing always outweighed his organizational and business sense, and he didn't have a lot of respect for authority, including his own. While Fischer could be a great cheerleader and figurehead, Birkby shows that he depended on others to do much of the grunt work in his business as a mountain guide service provider. Birkby pieces his life together with interviews with family, friends, and fellow climbers, with special attention given to Wes Krause, Wally Berg, and Ed Viesturs for some of his bigger climbs. In Fischer's Himalayan career, Birkby uses Rob Hall as a contrast, both in Hall's successes and operations.

Fischer had a long, frustrating relationship with Everest. He organized and nominally led his first attempt, post-monsoon in 1987 via the Australian North Face route. He thought his fellow climbers, none of whom had Everest experience, would be self-motivated to help with load carrying to the various camps, and that all the equipment would sort itself out between the climbers. Despite this, had the weather been obliging, he and several other climbers (including Stacy Allison, see her Many Mountains to Climb) were poised to make a viable, though not strong, attempt on the summit at the end of the season. He returns, this time via Nepal, in the pre-monsoon season of 1989 for On Top Everest medical research expedition, under McConnell and Reynolds, that has the summit as a secondary objective. He and Wally Berg were taken on as ringers to push the route and make the important climbing decisions. Though Fischer makes three attempts at the summit, ultimately a less experienced climber and two Sherpa make the summit after he had exhausted himself, though tragedy strikes on their descent. He returned in 1990 with Glen Porzak's Everest-Lhotse team to become one of the first two Americans to climb Lhotse, but the team was packing their bags before he could get ready for Everest. Finally, in 1994, with a NOLS crew under Steven Goryl billed as the Sagarmatha Environmental Expedition, Fischer made the top without supplemental oxygen along with Rob Hess. His 1996 expedition, of course, is legend. Birkby supplements the usual tale with interviews with his surviving guides Neal Beidleman and Brent Bishop (who led the trekkers), as well as a couple quotes from his clients.

Above All Else, by Clarke & Hobson

Jamie Clarke and Alan Hobson write their first Everest book, documenting their first two expeditions to the mountain in Above All Else: The Everest Dream (also know as The Power of Passion: Achieve Your Own Everests). They write about their experiences providing the satellite communications system for Peter Austen's charity Everest climb post-monsoon in 1991 (as chronicled in Everest Canada: The Climb for Hope) as well as their organizing and leading their own pre-monsoon expedition in 1994. They wrap their experiences around the message of achieving your own Everests, admitting that at times your struggles may be even harder than climbing the world's highest mountain. The summit is indeed something to strive for, but success for them comes from the satisfaction after an all-in effort. In addition to their climbs, the authors discuss their friendship and their experiences as motivational speakers.

For their 1991 climb, they participate primarily as support personnel. Hobson desperately wants to get to Everest and calls up Peter Austen, offering to provide live satellite communication from the mountain, even though he has no idea how to do that. He figures that out as he secures the equipment and has it shipped to the mountain; Clarke, meanwhile does a lot of grunt work of calling sponsors, and ties up the loose ends of the logistics, securing himself a place on the expedition through Hobson. Things go smoothly with the equipment, though the expedition faces a number of problems with the weather and an injured climber.

In 1994, they do their best to learn from the difficulties of the 1991 climb. They opt for a smaller team, opt out of climbing oxygen (saving much logistics, weight, and money), and chase after a single large sponsor rather than a range of smaller ones. Their quest to place the first Canadian climbing without supplementary oxygen on the summit is also a charity climb, seeking to raise funds and awareness for the Alberta Lung Association. Health issues cause the expedition to arrive at Base Camp without either Hobson or Clarke,and when they finally arrive, things are a bit messy. They still manage to put in a grand effort, with a number of close calls.

To read about Hobson and Clarke's personal success climbing to the summit of Everest during a subsequent expedition, try Hobson's From Everest to Enlightenment or Clarke's From Everest to Arabia. 

Great True Mountain Stories, edited by Edmund V. Corbett

Edmund Corbett pulls together a collection of mountaineering stories from a range of sources in Great True Mountain Stories. The 1957 collection includes a number of classics, such as excerpts from Whymper's account of the ascent and tragedy on the Matterhorn and Albert Smith's account of the first ascent of Mont Blanc, but also has a surprising number of current excerpts, including Herzog's Annapurna, Herrligkoffer's Nanga Parbat, Hillary's High Adventure, Evan's Kanchenjunga: The Untrodden Peak, Houston and Bates' K2: The Savage Mountain, and a newspaper account of a climbing tragedy on Mont Blanc from the year of the collection's publication. Also included are a couple of rarer treasures, such as Abraham's account of the death of Owen Glynne Jones and Egeler's account of a close call with Lionel Terray on Huantsan from The Untrodden Andes. Corbett introduces each work, and does a fairly good job of picking excepts that work on their own.

The book includes three Everest excerpts. Corbett chooses Mallory's account of the third attempt on the mountain from The Assault on Mount Everest 1922, from the return of Finch and Bruce to Base Camp to the after effects of the great avalanche. Next is Noel Odell's fruitless search for Mallory and Irvine from Younghuband's The Epic of Mount Everest, from his first night at Camp V to his signaling Camp IV the tragic news. Last is Edmund Hillary's account, from High Adventure, of his summit climb with Tenzing Norgay, from stepping out of the Camp IX tent to the final "whacks" to the summit. Of related interest are two excerpts from Smythe books (about Kamet and Kanchenjunga) and Charles Evan's account of the 1955 Kanchenjunga climb.

The Villain, by Jim Perrin

Jim Perrin cuts the legendary Don Whillans down to size in The Villain: A Portrait of Don Whillans. The mountaineering literature is full of conflated, over-the-top Whillans stories, giving his memory a bit of a mythical edge. Having come to know Whillans through the literature, I was disappointed to find out that, alas, even Whillans is human. Perrin sorts through the many Whillans stories to piece together the most likely true character behind the hard-as-nails, yet witty image. You may not have realized that Whillans was a tropical fish enthusiast, that he had a fairly comfortable upbringing (at least, compared to Joe Brown), or that he had a soft spot for kids. Perrin traces his life from childhood, through his gritstone and Rock and Ice climbs, to his Alpine career, and his climbs in the Himalaya and around the world. He shows that Whillans begrudged the shadow of Joe Brown's career, and that he never quite escaped his contempt for his more successful climbing partner. Again with Bonington, he initially accomplishes great things, only to find himself left behind during Bonington's later successes. Perrins paints a complex picture of a man both ambitious and destructive, who has a great talent for climbing, but consistently has trouble in climbing relationships and ruins his own health by the time he's forty.

Whillans is partly known for his participation in two attempts on the Southwest Face of Everest, the 1971 international expedition and the 1972 European expedition, as well as his non-participation in the two Southwest Face climbs by Bonington's crew. Much of what Perrin includes about these climbs is found in other sources. However, he explains the animosity between Mazeaud and Whillans a little more clearly and includes a story of their encounter on the flight to the approach that sharpens Mazeaud's anger a bit. (He was initially miffed that Whillans "stole" the Central Pillar of the Freney after Mazeaud's epic survival of a lengthy storm on the route.) Also, Perrin includes parts of an interview with John Cleare, who explains Whillans' pivotal role in the attempted rescue of Harsh Bahuguna. The 1972 European expedition only gets a couple pages in this book, with no new information or analysis, as although Whillans participated, the expedition for him was defined more by what he was prevented from doing than what he contributed. Though Perrin cites the usual reasons for Whillans non-inclusion in the Bonington climbs, he does include some additional back-story with Whillans' jousting with Estcourt over statistics from the Annapurna climb.

Everest: Goddess of the Wind, by Ronald Faux

Ronald Faux writes a compressed history of climbing the world's highest mountain in Everest: Goddess of the Wind. Like Ahluwalia, in Faces of Everest, Faux caps off a an era of climbing on Everest with a history published in 1978, though he gets in a mention of Messner and Habeler's historic ascent. It's hard not to compare these two books, as they largely serve the same purpose and cover the same material. Faux's book is considerably more British-centric, whereas Ahluwalia treats all expeditions roughly equally. They both include their own contribution to the history of Everest (Faux participated in the 1976 Joint Services Expedition; see his and Fleming's Soldiers on Everest.), and discuss each visit to the mountain by climbers. Faux also writes a short description of Nepal, its people, flora, and fauna, including a chapter on the yeti. The book includes photographic illustrations throughout, as well as some maps and a great page of newspaper clippings about the 1953 ascent.

Because the book is so short (roughly 100 pages), Faux had to make some difficult decisions about how to tell the story, especially regarding the early history. The 1921 reconnaissance gets only a few paragraphs, and the 1922 climbs comes off more as an encyclopedia entry than a dramatic story. Maurice Wilson, the 1935 reconnaissance, and the 1938 climb share a single paragraph. I realize he had to cut somewhere, but I think I would have ditched the 30 pages on the yeti and Nepal for a more focused narrative on the subject advertised by the cover and the introduction to the book. The Nepal section is nice, regardless, though it feels a bit like a separate book. Many of the subsequent climbs from 1950 through to the publication date have detail in proportion to the number of British climbers on the roster, with the 1953 and 1975 and 1976 climbs getting the most coverage.

Die Trying, by Bo Parfet

Bo Parfet comes of age in Die Trying: One Man's Quest to Conquer the Seven Summits. He overcomes dyslexia to graduate from both high school and college and becomes an investment banker at JP Morgan.  He remembers how he felt climbing Longs Peak in college and books a trip to Kilimanjaro to get away from his 100-hour workweeks. After making the top, he heads to Aconcagua and McKinley on subsequent vacations before devoting himself to climbing the Seven Summits. He decides to climb both lists, in addition to Mount Cook, Mont Blanc (perhaps to cover his bases?), the Matterhorn, Cho Oyu, and an attempt on Ama Dablam. Also included in the narrative is his participation in the Gumball 3000 road race and the La Ruta Maya boat race, as well as his journey to membership in the Explorers Club. His climbs exhibit the gamut of commercial climbing, from full-on guided climbs on Kilimanjaro and McKinley to a logistics-only (including payments for fixed ropes and summit support) ascent of Everest. He uses a range of outfitters, including Mountain Trip, Mountain Madness, International Mountain Guides, and Himalayan Guides, and even (with some difficulty) tries his own logistics for Elbrus. Die Trying, therefore makes a decent preview for the Seven Summits shopper.

He books both of his Everest climbs with Henry Todd's Himalayan Guides, both for some autonomy in his climbing and for a relatively low price. His first attempt, in the pre-monsoon season of 2005, goes poorly for several reasons, including friction between Parfet and Todd, impatient climbing, and deceptive weather. Tragedy strikes on the teams' summit attempt, and an incoming storm adds the coup de grace. His second expedition, in the spring of 2007, goes somewhat smoother. There's less information in the narrative on it, but he returns a more experienced climber (having ascended Cho Oyu the previous fall) and as a sponsored mountaineer. He brings much of his family along for the trek to Base Camp, with his parents making it as far as Lobuche. His team includes Pat Hickey, author of 7 Summits: A Nurse's Quest to Conquer Mountaineering and Life. The weather is much more agreeable for this climb, even providing a sunny and (relatively) warm summit day.

Camp Six, by Frank Smythe

Frank Smythe writes about his experiences during the 1933 Everest expedition in Camp Six. 1933 was Smythe's first trip to Everest (of three) and also the expedition in which he climbed the highest. The book is a well-deserved classic of climbing literature, with Smythe describing for a broad audience the business of climbing Everest. He even (horror upon horrors!) describes the joys of late night sub-zero bathroom calls and hints at the foul language climbers used towards the frustrating cookers. Though the official account, Everest 1933, is already an entertaining and rigorous narrative, Smythe's book adds some flavor to the journey and gets away with some commentary that would be inappropriate in an official release. Also, Smythe's use of pet names (Billy, Waggers, etc.) humanize the protagonists a bit more, and his praising of their accomplishments is more forthright here. He explains why he likes to climb with Shipton and also expresses a friendly affection for George Wood-Johnson (who accompanied him to Kanchenjunga).

Smythe is the only Everest climber from the 1930s to give a book-length account of his climb (apart from the "official" books). Greene (Moments of Being) and Boustead (Winds of Morning) would later include details of the 1933 account in their memoirs. Shipton would later write a history of climbing Everest, Men Against Everest, thank includes his personal experiences. I think that Smythe's writing, both before and after his Everest experience, established his reputation as a great man in the history of Everest. His accomplishment in 1933 is staggering (spending three nights at Camp VI and above without oxygen, three forays on the North Ridge, and a difficult solo climb very high on the mountain, all while returning the healthiest man of the assault party), but I think we know of Smythe rather than Wager and Wyn-Harris, who also climbed as high as he did, because of his literary effort. Camp Six is an enjoyable book; I think you'll like it!

To learn more about Smythe's life, read Calvert's biography, Smythe's Mountains.

Live the Dream, by Art Valdez

Art Valdez tells of the first Filipino ascent of Mount Everest in Live the Dream: The Saga of the Philippine Mount Everest Expedition Team. He tried in vain to organize a team in 1985, but had better luck starting in 2003. As the Philippines had few experienced mountaineers, a group of thirty chosen climbers set out to train and aim for inclusion in a small final team. Their trips include alpine climbing courses in India and New Zealand, and climbs on McKinley, Muztagh Ata, and Cho Oyu before the trip to Everest. (Due to their Muztagh Ata climb, the first operation in the Philippines for frostbite was performed.) Fundraising is continually a problem, even up to the approach march to Everest (one climber even harvests potatoes in exchange for better meals), but they manage somehow. Though the team was originally supposed to be both men and women, the women opt for a climb a year later (in which three ladies traverse the mountain North-South).

Their team helps the first three (undisputed) Filipino climbers reach the summit, from the south in May of 2006. The details of their climb, indeed all their climbs, are sparse, as the book is primarily a photo exhibition. Their base camp doctor is popular with other teams, and the summit climbers reach the top on three successive days. The McKinley and Cho Oyu climbs have photos, but are not a part of the narrative. The Muztagh Ata climb is a part of the narrative, but has no photos. The photographs are high quality and journalistic in style, with a bit of salesmanship thrown in. The book overall feels like a modern Another Ascent of the World's Highest Peak - Qomolangma, the official photobook release after the 1975 Chinese ascent, but without the Chairman Mao theme.