(Not) another Jon Krakauer

While I may be alone in this sentiment, tones of this book’s introduction reminded me of Into Thin Air, namely the dramatic buildup to the “but that’s not really how it happened” blow. This may not be coincidence, as David Roberts was for some time a close mentor and teacher of Jon Krakauer at Hampshire College.…

True Summit: What REALLY Happened

The entire time I was reading this book, all I kept thinking was…mic drop. In True Summit, David Roberts reveals the truth of what really happened when Maurice Herzog summited Annapurna on June 3, 1950. Robert’s does a great job starting off the book by re-introducing the summit events the way it was told by…

True Summit

So it would seem that Herzog’s account of his famed 1950’s expedition was malarky positing him as the hero and complete leader of this tight well-oiled climbing machine. Naturally his exploits were that of heroic lore which would forever cement him within French climbing history and secure him in a nice cushy political job for…

True Summit

True Summit transformed Herzog’s bland, overdramatic, national fairy tale into a true adventure story, racked not only by weather and mountains, but also by anger bordering on hate. Every bad notion I had of Herzog was confirmed by Roberts and his compilation of memoirs by the “knights of the sky”, especially Lachenal’s. A crucial moment…

True Summit – week 13

Reading Response week 13 – True Summit Bryant Lymburn In the work by David Roberts, True Summit, he recounts the expedition and ultimate successful tragedy of the French’s attempt on Annapurna. Roberts analyzes the expedition and each member in the climbing party. He documents each individuals accomplishments and there attitude to the expedition though their…

True Summit

In a way this book does something we have done in discussion all semester. Seeing that this book is written in 2000, it seems almost that the 1990’s and early 2000’s have brought an age of questioning the pasts mountaineering excursions, much like the fact that we are all taking a ‘history of mountaineering course,’…

Week 13 True Summit

I thought this weeks reading was highly interesting because it provided us with a look back on an event that had already occurred and that we had moved past. For the majority of the semester, it would seem, that we moved forward chronologically visiting new adventures and new climbs and new problems facing climbing where…

True Summit

The very beginning of True Summit started as most of the mountaineering books do, with an account of an ascent, the history of high-altitude mountaineering and the countries involved in first ascents. As the book started to progress, I felt that my perception of Herzog and the self-described euphoric and pure experience on his Annapurna…

True Summit, Week 13

Much like a commanding general, Maurice Herzog took all the glory to be held for climbing the first 8,000 meter peak. Fifty years later, David Roberts reevaluated the mountaineering classic and attempted to spread the fame. Roberts, being Krakauer’s mentor, showed a very similar style in the way he presented his books, primarily as an…