This book was well told. At times I felt oxygen deprived and often this made me unaware of tragedy. I am not a huge fan of non-fiction but this is worth a read.

Read within the span of 10 hours. This is not a hard read, well, if you take out the subject matter.
I picked this up because 'Into the Wild' has been out or on hold for months at the library so I thought I'd at least get a feel for Jon Krakauer's writing style.
I also have to admit that it wasn't the writing style that sold me, not that it isn't well done, but usually I'm not drawn to 'personal accounts' or non-fiction, in general, unless it is a subject that really fascinates me. I'm an escapist and sometimes the reality of all this seeps in and rattles me in ways I'd rather not tap into.
This is very much rubbernecking. I knew that there is no happy ending to this tale, yet I was riveted and sickened the whole way through.
I wasn't drawn so much to the feat of the climb or the determination of the climbers but more to their never ending egos and downright obsession. Their fanatical need to conquer. The fact that these people spend upwards of $65,000 to subject themselves to hypoxia, frostbite, and possible cerebral edemas just makes me shake my head and say 'what the fuck?'

Krakauer states in the first chapter that once reaching the summit, a sheet of ice at 29,028 feet above seal level, he couldn't summon the energy to care. He spent less than 5 minutes on the 'roof of the world' with absolutely no spiritual awakening to speak of.
What makes people do this? What drives them to become so consumed with the thought of scaling a mountain that's killed 1 in 4 climbers since the first summit reach in 1953?

Because it's there.

Which, on its own, I can understand, sort of. But, to get there and not feel the euphoria? That's where I become lost. This passage, in particular, floored me:

"People who don't climb mountains...tend to assume that the sport is a reckless Dionysian pursuit of ever escalating thrills.... The ratio of misery to pleasure was greater by an order of magnitude than any other mountains I'd been on. I quickly came to understand that climbing Everest was primarily about enduring pain."

The fact that the drive to reach the summit had climbers walking over corpses of their peers also is mind-numbing. To think that some of these climbers were so single-minded that they would assess a fellow climber, make the instantaneous decision that they would be nothing more than baggage and refuse to help them sends me spiraling to that survival of the fittest mentality that makes my stomach curl.
This is a freakin' Darwinian rat race.

I need to research this further, the IMAX film has been netflixed and I'm adding the K2 disaster and other stories to my reading list. What a fun summer this will be.

This book was insane. No way in hell. These people are nuts.

Krakauer's retelling of the story of the '96 Everest disaster lives up to its billing. It is superb. But in the version I read I felt the acrimonious positioning of his case in thr postscript detracted from the main body of the text and didn't add much to the book apart from giving Krakauer an uncontested platform to posit his view on the reaction to the controversy around the book. It's not needed and can be found elsewhere for those interested.

Loved this book, read it years ago. The phone call to the wife from the mountain was chilling and monumentally sad.

d.

This is the only book I've ever read that literally gave me nightmares. This doesn't sound like much of a recommendation, I guess, but it's really a testament to the vividness of Krakauer's descriptive powers. When I think of that poor Japanese woman (Yasuko Namba), just fifty yards from rescue, laying faceup on the mountainside and being buried in snow, too weak to move as a sheet of ice formed over her face....(shudder).

Any ambitions I may have harbored to climb Everest were stopped in their tracks by his description of the ascent as "a Calvinistic exercise in the endurance of pain." And that's just getting up there. Getting down again is where things really get bad, and in his case, spectacularly so. The word "awe" is badly overused these days, but when I think about what he endured in putting this book together, both on the mountain and off, that's what I feel.

I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the biggest fan of non-fiction. I prefer to listen to podcasts or interviews, rather than read straight-up non-fiction about a certain topic. And as someone who isn't particularly interested in climbing or sports in general, this wouldn't be a book that I'd normally read. But I'm so glad that I did.

It definitely reads more like a memoir, since the author was present for the events of the story. That made it a much more palatable read for me, rather than a book about an event where the author does all the research but has no first-hand experience of the thing. However, after having read this I would definitely read anything else Krakauer has written or writes because he is such an amazing storyteller.

I was never bored reading this book. He blends history and personal accounts into a gripping, harrowing, horrifying, fascinating story. It's truly awful, but I couldn't put it down. I'm not sure how I particularly feel about being so interested in reading about a tragedy like this, but I also think it opened my eyes to SO many new things that there is definitely merit to the story. On top of that, I can only imagine it was a story Krakauer felt he had to tell after having lived through it. I will definitely be recommending this book to friends and suggesting it to people who, like me, are hesitant to pick up non-fiction books that aren't memoir.

Unfortunately, the sort of individual who is programmed to ignore personal distress and keep pushing for the top is frequently programmed to disregard signs of grave and imminent danger as well. This forms the nub of a dilemma that every Everest climber eventually comes up against: in order to succeed you must be exceedingly driven, but if you're too driven you're likely to die. Above 26,000 feet, moreover, the line between appropriate zeal and reckless summit fever becomes grievously thin. Thus the slopes of Everest are littered with corpses.

Into Thin Air gives the account of a disastrous day on Mount Everest in 1996, when 8 people lost their lives. The author, a journalist but also an accomplished climber, was among those attempting to reach the summit that day, and recounts what happened as far as it is possible to tell. The tragic events of that day seem not to have one cause, but were an accumulation of small errors in judgement, possibly coupled with a smidgen of hubris and machismo.

Krakauer does attempt to disavow the notion that mountain climbing is all about ego and adrenalin seekers:

Above the comforts of Base Camp, the expedition in fact became an almost Calvinistic undertaking. The ratio of misery to pleasure was greater by an order of magnitude than any other mountain I'd been on; I quickly came to understand that climbing Everest was primarily about enduring pain. And in subjecting ourselves to week after week of toil, tedium, and suffering, it struck me that most of us were probably seeking, above all else, something like a state of grace.

I'm not sure I'm totally convinced. Throughout the book, I found myself frequently scratching my head in bewilderment, thinking "why on Earth would anyone want to put themselves through this?" Maybe it is because I have absolutely no compulsion to conquer anything...other than perhaps the mountain that is my TBR pile :-)

It is testament to the skills of the author that, even though you know the outcome before you start reading, this book is such a page turner and the suspense is maintained throughout. It is a thrilling read.

Alongside the paperback for reference, I listened to the audiobook of this, narrated by Philip Franklin. He was mostly pretty good, other than when he did New Zealand or English accents - they were a little on the cringeworthy side.

I need to collect my thoughts. This was a dizzying read.

I recently took a course in writing narrative non-fiction where the professor opined that memoirs suffer when the writer is too close to the experience. I thought it was an interesting point, and at least one memoir I had read came to mind where the characters were almost cartoonish and it was clear that the memoirist had not gained enough distance from her experience to write about them fairly or three-dimensionally. Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster may be a legitimate counter-example though.

"Several authors and editors I respect counseled me not to write the book as quickly as I did," Krakauer acknowledges in his introduction. "They urged me to wait two or three years and put some distance between me and the expedition in order to gain some crucial perspective. Their advice was sound, but in the end I ignored it...I wanted my account to have a raw, ruthless sort of honesty that seemed in danger of leaching away with the passage of time and the dissipation of anguish." Raw is definitely the word here.

Krakauer, an ambitious mountaineer and journalist, jumped at the opportunity to climb Everest with a guided tour to write an article for "Outside" Magazine. His group, and other groups ascending at the same time, was made up of individuals from all walks of life with varying degrees of experience, willing to put themselves through incredible privations (with the possible exception of the woman who insisted on bringing an espresso maker and two laptops) just to ascend this mountain. But as we later learn, the hard part is actually getting back down.

It was a tragic, ill-fated mission. Krakauer lived to tell the tale and emerged relatively unscathed (physically, anyway); many others did not. A terrible, unanticipated storm, bad timing, some irresponsibility on the part of the guides which they might have gotten away with under other circumstances, and other factors converged with very sad results.

I suppose it could be argued that this tale might have been told better with more perspective and distance, but the rawness and immediacy really got to me. So many themes emerge. Man vs. nature. The narcissism of setting impossible goals, and being driven against all better judgement to push them through, and the price we pay for that. Arrogance, and being humbled. Things beyond our control, and how they sometimes combine with petty failures to control what we can.

For all its intensity, there were times when the narrative felt detail- and character-heavy and bogged down a bit. Overall, though, a harrowing read which made me feel glad I was curled up in my bed and not braving some mountaintop.

~৩.৫/৫~
যদি সমুদ্রপৃষ্ঠ থেকে হঠাৎ এভারেস্ট পর্বতের চূড়ায় কাওকে টেলিপোর্ট করা হয়, তার ঠিক কী অবস্থা হবে? সঙ্গে সঙ্গে না হলেও এটা নিশ্চিতভাবে বলা যায় কয়েক মিনিটের মধ্যে তাকে লড়তে হবে মৃত্যুর সাথে।
মানুষ যখন দিনের পর দিন পর্বত আরোহণ করে তখন উচ্চতা বাড়বার সাথে সাথে পরিবেশের উপাদানের বিশেষ কিছু পরিবর্তন সাধিত হয়। তার মধ্যে সব চেয়ে গুরুত্বপূর্ণ হল, অক্সিজেনের পরিমাণ। এছাড়া এভারেস্টের ২৯,০২৯ ফুট উচ্চতায় একজন পর্বতারোহীর শরীরেও নিরবে ঘটতে থাকে বেশ কিছু শারীরিক পরিবর্তন। এমন সাংঘাতিক উচ্চতায় একজন পর্বতারোহী যে কি পরিমাণ শারীরিক ও মানসিক চাপের মধ্যে থাকে তা হয়তো আমাদের পক্ষে অনুভব করা প্রায় অসম্ভব। আর এর সাথে যদি যুক্ত হয় প্রাকৃতিক দুর্যোগ, তাহলে?

গাইডের মাধ্যমে পরিচালিত এভারেস্ট আরোহণ বিষয় নিয়ে লেখালেখি করার জন্য Outside ম্যাগাজিন দায়িত্ব দেয় সাংবাদিক জন ক্রাকাওয়ারকে। ১৯৯৬ সালের মার্চে একটি অভিজানে তিনি অংশগ্রহণ করতে নেপালে যান। অভিজানে নেতৃত্ব দেন নিউজিল্যান্ডের খ্যাতনামা পর্বতারোহী রবার্ট হল। ১০ই মে তাদের দল এভারেস্টের চূড়ায় ওঠে। কিন্তু চূড়ায় উঠতে তাদের চরম মূল্য দিতে হয়। চূড়ায় উঠবার দিন প্রচণ্ড ঝড়ের কবলে রবার্ট হল সহ চারজন পর্বতারোহী প্রাণ হারান। একই দিনে আরও চারটি অভিযাত্রী দলের মোট নয়জন মারা যান। মূলত এই এডভেঞ্চারের শুরু থেকে প্রাণঘাতী ওই দিনে ঠিক কী ঘটেছিল তারই ভয়ঙ্কর কাহিনী সাংবাদিক জন ক্রাকাওয়ার বর্ণনা করেন Into Thin Air বইয়ে। বাস্তব ঘটনার বর্ণনা কল্পকাহিনীর মতোই রোমাঞ্চকর, একই সাথে শ্বাসরুদ্ধকর।

পর্বত আরোহণের প্রতি আগ্রহ থাকায় বইটি দ্রুত পড়ে নিলাম। আমার দৌড় আপাতত গাঢ়ো পাহাড় পর্যন্ত। তবে খুব শীঘ্রই বাঙলা ও বিহারের উঁচু উঁচু পর্বতমালার দিকে এগিয়ে যাবো। আশা করি এর মাঝে আরও কিছু পর্বতারোহণ বিষয়ক ভালো বই খুঁজে পাবো।
বইটির বাতিঘর অনুবাদ মোটামুটি ভালো। মূল বইটি পড়তে পারলে মনে হয় আরও ভালো হত।

One of the most horrifying things I've read in a while. The sense of doom is palpable. I knew Everest climbers are always walking past corpses but...corpses of people they knew? Infinitely worse, there's two separate descriptions of people literally walking past dying or desperate mountaineers and just *leaving* them to die because to help them would mean...not getting to the top of the pointy rock. Christ.

The book is a howl of pain from someone who if only belatedly realised the human cost of getting up the pointy rock wasn't worth whatever they gained from doing so. What that gain might be, spiritual enlightenment or sense of achievement over nature or whatever, is not made clear by this author, which isn't surprising given how many people died.

Let us not dwell on the super rich USian proto influencer who made Sherpas carry 80lbs of electronics up Everest so she could post the 1990s equivalent of selfies.

Good lord, basically.

If Krakauer's intention was to kill all of our romantic ideas about mountain climbing with this book, he undoubtedly succeeded. Whatever idealistic notions of bravery, athleticism, adventure, and brotherhood I had about this "sport", are now gone forever.

What Krakauer delivers instead is a very tough picture of people who are ready to risk their lives and lives of those around them (guides, Sherpas, rescue workers) for the purpose of satisfying some masochistic macho aspirations of theirs or, even worse, to get some cheap fame. I now know that there is no sportsmanship or athleticism or fitness about these trips to the top of Everest. People kill their brain cells, they freeze off their body parts, they lose eye sight, they die, all for the privilege of standing on the top of the world for a few seconds. I never understood this achievement before, I understand it even less now, knowing the costs of it. Even more, what kind of an achievement it is, if everything is done for you - Sherpas build your camps, make your food, carry your baggage (including laptops, TVs, gourmet foods, and magazines), fix ropes for you to hang on, even haul you to the top if needed?

But enough of ranting, time to talk about the book itself. I think Krakauer is a great non-fiction writer who manages to suck you into any story. Same goes for "Into Thin Air." It is a compelling book, more interesting in the latter part than in the beginning (once you pass 150-page mark, the book is virtually unputdownable). I personally would have preferred him to talk more about the trip and its difficulties rather than recounting everyone's back stories, but in the end, I have to admit, it adds certain relatability to the narrative. I also was afraid that he would spend a lot of time assigning blame to various players (including himself), but was pleased to see that he had learned from his "Outsider" article and came to the right conclusion that the Everest disaster was nobody's fault.

Overall, a very interesting and in many ways eye-opening story, which in spite of being beyond my scope of interest, managed to hold my attention.

Reading challenge: #10