Customer Reviews

Eric Shipton : The 6 Mountain-Travel Books

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

It is a travel in itself. The form, structure and phrasing is almost alliterated to the rythm and timing of high-mountain travel in the beginning of the century.

Eric Shipton was one of THE great climbers and mountaineering authors of the 1930's. Shipton climbed with H.W. Tilman and Frank Smythe (both of whose collections of books have been republished by the same publishing house as this book). Incidentally, Shipton was on the early expedition that explored the southern approach to Everest after the route thru Tibet was closed off post WWII,and,like Tilman and Smythe, was on a number of the pre-WWI Everest expeditions.

Some of Shipton's best writing is in this book and it reads as well today as it did when it was written. Some enthralling accounts of his climbs as well as a good deal of exploration ("Blank on the Map", one of the books in this collection, is worth the price of the book all by itself - an account of the time Shipton, Tilman and a small group spent exploring a remote area of the Karakoram's).

If you like books about climbing that are well-written and entertaining, this is an excellent pick. Just don't expect too much technical climbing jargon or step by step / hold by hold accounts of climbs.

The books of Eric Shipton takes one back to the glorious days of Himalayan exploration when every turn on the mountain trail could reveal a sight, hitherto unknown to human eyes. It is no surprise that some of the grandest secrets of the Himalayas were revealed to probably the most sympathetic, poetic and daring explorers of all time. Reading these books takes one upon a blissful journey into the soul of the most beautiful creation of nature

This is a collection of Shipton's writings, most of which I had already read, though some was new. It is very useful to have them all between one cover, and they hark back to the days when there were still blanks on the map.

Eric Shipton's career as a climber and explorer spanned some five decades, from his apprenticeship in the Alps in the 1920's, to his early exploits in Africa, his remarkable expeditions in the Himalayas and Western China, his participation in the conquest of Everest, and his role in opening up Patagonia as a worthy destination in the 1960's. Shipton, although a highly competent mountaineer, was more drawn by the prospect of exploring unknown country than of bagging first ascents on high peaks and is largely forgotten today. However, Shipton was one of the more gifted writers of his climbing generation, and this collection captures the best of his work.

"The Six Mountain-Travel Books" brings together Shipton's best travel commentary in a single volume. It includes "Nanda Devi", his account of the 1934 expedition with climbing partner Bill Tilman that first breached the inner sanctum of that previous withheld mountain in Northern India. "Blank on the Map" is Shipton's and Tilman's exploration of the largely unsurveyed areas in the Karakoram north and west of K2 in 1937 and 1939. "Upon That Mountain" is a first autobiographical foray, mostly about Africa and the 1930's expeditions to Everest. "Mountains of Tartary", nominally about Shipton's diplomatic career in Western China, is really the story of short forays into the many mountain ranges of remote Sinkiang Province. The "Mount Everest Reconnaissance Expedition of 1951" opened up the southern approach that is now the classic route to the top of Everest. "Land of Tempest" is an account of Shipton's ground-breaking exploration of then mostly unknown Patagonia in South America.

Shipton delights the reader with his understated, ironic, and often humorous writing style; he entertains with his descriptive narrative of parts unknown; he enlightens with his thoughtful analysis of how and why people climb and explore. In these pages, the reader can follow Shipton as he works out his pioneering "light" approach to mountaineering and exploring, an ethic much more popular now then in his day. While light expeditions have their limits in that they trade endurance for speed, they leave explorers, in Shipton's view, less insulated from the experience of the environments they travel through.

"The Six Mountain-Travel Books" is very highly recommended both as an excellent history of high skill climbing and exploration and as a thoughtful journey through the motivation to explore wide-open spaces.