Required Texts
Peter Bayers, Imperial Ascent: Mountaineering, Masculinity & Empire
René Daumal, Mount Analogue: A Tale of Non-Euclidean and Symbolically Authentic Mountaineering Adventures
Heinrich Harrer, Seven Years in Tibet
Heinrich Harrer, The White Spider: The Story of the North Face of the Eiger
Maurice Herzog, Annapurna: The First Conquest of an 8000-Meter Peak
Charles Houston & Robert Bates, K2: The Savage Mountain
Maurice Isserman & Stewart Weaver, Fallen Giants: A History of Himalayan Mountaineering from the Age of Empire to the Age of Extremes
Jon Krakauer, Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mt. Everest Disaster
Robert Macfarlane, Mountains of the Mind: Adventures in Reaching the Summit
Sherry Ortner, Life and Death on Mount Everest: Sherpas and Himalayan Mountaineering
David Roberts, True Summit: What Really Happened on the Legendary Ascent of Annapurna
Sources for Other Assigned Readings
Bernard Debarbieux and Gilles Rudaz, The Mountain: A Political History from the Enlightenment to the Present
Daphne du Maurier, Don’t Look Now: Selected Stories of Daphne du Maurier
Marjorie Hope Nicolson, Mountain Gloom and Mountain Glory: The Development of the Aesthetics of the Infinite
Mary Louise Pratt, Imperial Eyes: Travel Writing and Transculturation
Susan R. Schrepfer, Nature’s Altars: Mountains, Gender, and American Environmentalism
Other Readings
On the academic end of the spectrum
Wade Davis, Into the Silence: The Great War, Mallory, and the Conquest of Everest
Peter & Leni Gillman, The Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory
Peter Hansen, The Summits of Modern Man: Mountaineering After the Enlightenment
Mike Searle, Colliding Continents: A Geological Exploration of the Himalaya, Karakoram, & Tibet
On the literary-autobiographical-memoir-popular end of the spectrum
Stacy Allison & Peter Carlin, Beyond the Limits: A Woman’s Triumph on Everest
Conrad Anker & David Roberts, The Lost Explorer: Finding Mallory on Mount Everest
Robert Bates & Charles Houston, Give Miles High
Chris Bennington & Charles Clarke, Tibet’s Secret Mountain: The Triumph of Sepu Kangri
Arlene Blum, Annapurna: A Woman’s Place
Walter Bonatti, The Mountains of My Life
Chris Bonington, Annapurna South Face
Chris Bonington, Boundless Horizons: The Autobiography of Chris Bonington
Anatoli Boukreev, Above the Clouds: The Diaries of a High-Altitude Mountaineer
Anatoli Boukreev & G. Weston DeWalk, The Climb: Tragic Ambitions on Everest
Graham Bowley, No Way Down: Life and Death on K2
W.E. Bowman, The Ascent of Rum Doodle
David Breshears, Last Climb: The Legendary Everest Expeditions of George Mallory
Herman Buhl, Nanga Parbat Pilgrimage: The Lonely Challenge
Greg Child, Thin Air: Encounters in the Himalayas
Maria Coffey, Where the Mountain Casts Its Shadow: The Dark Side of Extreme Adventure
Jim Curran, K2: The Story of the Savage Mountain
Jim Curran, K2, Triumph and Tragedy
Matt Dickinson, The Other Side of Everest
Kurt Diemberger, The Endless Knot: K2, Mountain of Dreams and Destiny
FUKADA Kyūya, One Hundred Mountains of Japan
Lene Gammelgaard, Climbing High
Andrew Greig, Summit Fever
Jochen Hemmleb, Eric Simonsson & Dave Hahn, Detectives on Everest: The 2001 Mallory & Irvine Research Expedition
Jochen Hemmleb, Larry Johnson & Eric Simonsson, Ghosts of Everest: The Search for Mallory and Irvine
Thomas Hornbein, Everest: The West Ridge
Michale Kodas, High Crimes: The Fate of Everest in an Age of Greed
Jon Krakauer, Eiger Dreams
Goran Kropp, Ultimate High: My Everest Odyssey
Nick Heil, Dark Summit: The True Story of Everest’s Most Controversial Season
Laurence Leamer, Ascent: The Spiritual and Physical Quest of Legendary Mountaineer Willi Unseold
Bernadette McDonald, Brotherhood of the Rope: The Biography of Charles Houston
Reinhold Messner, The Crystal Horizon
Reinhold Messner, Free Spirit: A Climber’s Life
Christopher Norton, Everest Revealed: The Private Diaries and Sketches of Edward Norton, 1922-24
Rick Ridgeway, The Last Step: The American Ascent of K2
Robert Roper, Fatal Mountaineer
John Roskelley, Nandi Devi: The Tragic Expedition
Galen Rowell, In the Throne Room of the Mountain Gods
Julie Summers, Fearless on Everest: The Quest for Sandy Irvine
Colin Thubron, To a Mountain in Tibet
Jim Whittaker, A Life on the Edge: Memoirs of Everest and Beyond
Freddie Wilkinson, One Mountain Thousand Summits: The Untold Story of Tragedy and True Heroism on K2
Clint Willis, The Boys of Everest: Chris Bonington and the Tragedy of Climbing’s Greatest Generation
Stephen Venables, A Slender Thread: Escaping Disaster in the Himalaya
Stephen Venables, Everest: Alone at the Summit
Ed Viesturs & David Roberts, K2: Life and Death on the World’s Most Dangerous Mountain
Ed Viesturs, No Shortcuts to the Top
Peter Zukerman, Buried in the Sky: The Extraordinary Story of the Sherpa Climbers on K2’s Deadliest Day
Films
Documentaries
Above All Else: The Everest Dream (1999)
Beyond the Edge (2014)
Blindsight (2006)
The Dark Glow of the Mountains (1984)
80 Meters Below the Summit (1997)
Everest: Beyond the Limit (2006-2009, TV series)
Everest: The Death Zone (1998)
Everest: 50 Years on the Mountain (2003)
Everest: IMAX (1998)
Hillary and Tenzing: Climbing to the Roof of the World (2003)
Into the Thin Air of Everest: Mountain of Dreams, Mountain of Doom (1999)
The Man Who Skied Down Everest (1975)
Meru (2015)
The Summit (2013)
Team Everest: A Himalayan Journey (2008)
Touching the Void (2003)
Vertical Frontier: A History of the Art, Sport and Philosophy of Rock Climbing in Yosemite (2002)
The Wildest Dream (2011)
Feature films
Cliffhanger (1993)
The Eiger Sanction (1975)
K2 (1991)
Nordwand [North Face] (2010)
Vertical Limit (2002)