Customer Reviews

Epic: Stories of Survival from the World's Highest Peaks

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Like everybody else, I read "Into Thin Air" and bought more mountaineering books, this being one. Luckily, climbers tend to be a pretty literary lot, because the basic theme of all these books is : Damn, we're out of food/its cold/ I can't feel my feet/hands/nose/my brain is swelling up/I lost my way/tent/sleeping bag/gloves/I almost (or you DID) fall off this cliff. All this is followed by the endless anticlimax of the summit if reached and, worst of all, endless navel contemplation about the meaning of it all. I don't know why this stuff is so compelling, but there it is. I read this book in four sittings when I had a lot of more important stuff to do. Then I went out and bought Everest: The West Ridge by Tom Hornbein. And I live in Florida , have never been higher than 5,000 feet and have never climbed anything higher than the roof of my house. Go figure. I will say that these mountaineering books have a significant collateral benefit - they scare the hell out of the wife.

I enjoyed this book, and read it in one day, pouring through the various chapters and one tragedy to the next. My only complaint is that many of the chapters were excerpts from other books, and the stories sometimes felt unfinished. Those excerpts would cover the hit (or near miss) of the summit, then cover some sort of trial to the participating climbers. The climbers may or may not survive the trial, and then that would be the end of it. I actually craved a little bit more of the post-expedition soul-searching.

This book contains the greatest short stories about climbing that I have ever read. Each story is unique and as entertaining as the other.

Well worth reading. If you liked into thin air you'll like this book.

These stories, all of excellent quality capture the allure of climbing, the starkness of the experience. They also present tremendously sobering arguments against the journey. As I read each chapter, I noted that almost all of the authors, most of them young men, either died or dissapeared on later expeditions. THAT added some power to their observations of how close the line is between being lucky and dying. A must-read over-view of the world of serious mountain-climbing.

Troy Stabenow

Clint Willis has created a fascinating series of books with Epic, Climb, High, Wild, Ice, Rough Water, and The War. Each of these volumes presents the best literature about their respective subjects in a powerful cohesive manner. These books are a quick read, but intricate and spellbinding. I have given many of them to friends and family as gifts.

This book is a collection of short stories about some very very very dificult climbings in the most dangerous places(mountains) under the most terrible conditions.
Among the stories are some classics like: The West Ridge-Everest(1.st ascent - Hornbein & Unsoeld); Annapurna(1.st ascent - Herzog version); k2 The Savage Mountain(The Schoening belay - by Bates and Houston); McKinley winter's ascent(by Art Davidson).
The book provides a good taste of the dificulties a climber must surpass in order to succed(survive), the only downpoint is that some stories just missed a more tradicional ending, basicaly because in the end you don't know what happened to the climbers, you can only assume they survive.

A rather commercial book! This is a compilation of reports of well known mountaineers on their glorious deeds on the highest and also mostly exploited mountains of the world, the Mt. Everest and the K2. It comprises a period of 60 years. Among the writers are exclusively protagonists, such names as Messner, Smythe, Bonatti, Bonington and others who report about their personal experiences.
Triumph and tragedy are nowhere so much close together as in the high altitude mountaineering. This becomes clear with this collection of stories. But thirst for glory and self-affirmation are also always included. They only remain unspoken mostly. So far mountaineers are always egoists. And this is often in conflict with the ethos which regards man as superior to his deeds. Of these one can read a lot, self-criticism is not the potency of the aspirant up-coming.
Is this all not going to become boring in the era of commercialization of those peaks and of the purchasability of adventures? No, because human tragedies as well as man`s victories are again fascinating. And it is not always the big deals! Fears and longings! Joys and grief! The one is tested hard when he climbs above a precipice on an alu-ladder on Everest North Col, the other is longing for the sunrise over China which will lessen the icy wind on the K2 and bring some warmth for the freezing hands and feet. Nobody is satisfied with the spectacular views from base camp!
In the death zone everybody is for himself, is often asserted. Matt Dickinson`s contribution tries to make this clear. He climbed the mountain 1996, at the same time as Lene Gammelgard, for who it was also the first adventure of such impact. She also wrote a report on the drama of these days. Mountains are mainly high, but mostly they have deep impact (and depth effect). And this even before you are up on them!
Gale Rowell`s and Brummie Stoke`s extractions from "In the throne room of the mountain Gods" and "Soldiers and Sherpas" they are in contrast to the others. Rowell is documenting the dissensions among the expedition participants. "The alliances, often called conspiracies from the others, are mostly nothing else but expression of the bilateral egoism." You ally yourself for the "common" goal to be the first on the summit! These kinds of contradictions are sometimes expensive to pay!
Stoke depicts the painfulness and difficulties somebody who returns to his normal life has to face in case of serious frost-bites. The simple life is sometimes frightening mean and unheroic! Mountaineering is shrinking to a silly hobby! And when Gammelgards spiritual balance after the survival of the 1996 tragedy is just: "The true, final valid rule is properly that nature does not allow to be controlled", then everybody knows that even mountaineers are teachable - and down to Earth! Sometimes you have to suffice with the little things!
The contribution of David Roberts has to be underlined. The German Kurt Wiesner was the leader of the US-expedition of 1939 in the course of which four mountaineers lost their lives. Wiesner had been blamed for this very long - unjustified. In fact Wiesner refrained from the very close summit success in favour of security. Robert is adjusting this.
The texts contain not the most important successes on these mountains, instead they were chosen after the principle that they should be entertaining. This they do. But you get only half of the story and less. And this is not really satisfying. Whoever is more interested in a chronological or historic description, is better served with Walt Unsworths "Everest" or Jim Currans "K2".

This book is like a sampler box of climbing stories. It's not a bad collection, but in the end it's a rather unsatisfying meal.

The problem is that most of the stories are excerpts from books, making it hard for readers to fully understand the context of the events they're reading about. It's as if you're suddenly thrown into a dramatic scene on the edge of a mountain without knowing who your climbing partners are or how you got there. Also, several of the stories leave the reader hanging at the end.

The best story of them all was John Climaco's "Dangerous Liaisons," a tale of his exasperating battle with the arrogant Pakistani liason officer who ruined his expedition. (Ironically, it is only tangentially about climbing.)

I also liked Art Davidson's tale of being pinned down in a storm on Mt. McKinley, one of those stories where you can practically feel the chill wind down your back and the frostbite in your toes. Still, it is one of the excerpts that leaves the reader wondering what happens next.

In all, readers interested in mountain climbing stories will be better served by seeking out the original books from which these stories are taken.

Willis' compilations include well-chosen "high points" from selected mountaineering books. Serious climbing-book readers will already have most of the books, but those who just want to get to the solo bivouac scene in which our hero freezes all his toes after losing his partners to an avalanche will find Epic a good buy.