Customer Reviews

On the Ridge Between Life and Death: A Climbing Life Reexamined

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Having read Roberts book, "Mountain of my Fear" I thought I was in for a great mountaineering read. Instead what I received is an introspective autobiography attempting to describe why he climbed and how his life developed.

Raised in Colorado Roberts spent a substantial amount of time describing teenage influences that had profound effects on his life forever that he continually revisits in this book, a mountain tragedy and a personal tragedy not handled today in the same manner as the 1950/early 60s. His formative education at Harvard in mathematics gets sidetracked by his love for the mountains and the expeditions to Alaska to climb and conquer new peaks. Along the way his life forms not as a mathematician but a writer. Roberts describes in great detail the hardships and drive required to be a successful climber. And yes, he's seen his share of death and as described in the book, been very close to it himself.

The next interesting facet of this book has him at a new-age college in New Hampshire teaching writing and running the outdoors program. Here he meets and helps shape a young obsessed climber, Jon Krakauer. In fact, Roberts takes credit for talking Krakauer out of a life as a carpenter into a career as a budding writer renowned for his book "Into Thin Air."

The final part of the book brings closure to this interesting life and how he drifted away from the dangers of the mountain and why. This introspective look is fascinating as he ties his parents, early girlfriend and climbing partners into the web that is his life. If you have an interest in climbing or are interested in growing up in America from the 50s on, I think this book will be enjoyable. David Roberts is truly one of the great climbing writers of his generation and this is a worthy tribute to his legacy.

I'm a climber only in the sense that I have paid guides to lead me up big mountains, which in the climbing world doesn't count for much. But I have been cold and afraid in the mountains, enough to appreciate what Roberts is talking about. A few days before what was my biggest climb, I met a young Argentine who would die a few days later on Alpamayo. We heard the news on the radio our Peruvian porters listened to incessantly (yes, I used porters). Something that has always bothered me about real climbers is their attitude toward risk, which is a euphemism for death. The 'hard man' attitude that Roberts discusses is very real. It is just casually accepted that people die climbing, and that it is worth the risk. Roberts's unique honesty allows the reader to see where the hard man comes from. He does it by painting a fairly painfully unflattering portrait of himself. Maybe even more unflattering than he intended. I am not a very hard man, and I found his description of Ed's death on Mt. Huntington and the subsequent telling of his parents almost unbearably sad. As is his description of his disastrous high school love affair. Somehow, Roberts has managed to write a book that conveys the majesty of the grand ranges, and why climbing breeds obsession, without letting the tragedy, of which there is plenty, fade entirely into the background. He has also ruthlessly kept out the various hackneyed sentiments often found in mountaineering books. Not any Mark Twight type hard man preening here, and the brooding is more under control than in Joe Simpson's later books, though I like them as well. But,when the rat is gnawing, and you're wondering whether maybe your planned route is too ambitious, like maybe fatally so, this is not the book to read. Save it for a chair and a warm fire.

I was surprised by the openness of David Roberts book. The first that I've read of his works, it revealed what a climber thinks before, during, and after a climb, regardless of its technical difficulty. I found the feelings of climber's spouses, immediate family, and friends to be contradictory, yet aligned in an odd fashion. I thought that Roberts was brave, not only in his climbing, but in sharing his intimate feelings with the world.

Roberts' book also took me into the world of higher education, revealing the politics and how many administrators are stuck in stupid mode.

Despite the descriptive nature of the book, I still wish there were photographs in the book to help me visualize the book's many characters. Roberts' vocabulary helped me to expand mine, as I frequently sought out the dictionary.

This book drew me in from start to finish. Being an avid climber myself I enjoyed reading about someone else so caught up in the lifestyle. I was swept away to the remote ranges of Alaska fully entertained by his stories of first ascents and failed attempts on some very respectable peaks. Just when I thought the book had climaxed and couldn't get any better, there he was, telling about another gripping climbing trip back to Alaska, or Canada, or a close call in the states. The book is laced with tragedy, both in his life, and his accounts of what has happened to others in the climbing community. Roberts evaluates what climbing has meant to him and what the impact has been on others. You don't have to be a climber to enjoy this book. Is it worth the risk?, read the book and decide for yourself.

I eagerly awaited the arrival of this book as I have enjoyed reading David Roberts' other books on climbing and the Southwest. In this book Roberts' gives us an honest, revealing look at his early high school years through to the present day, concentrating on the various aspects of his life from climbing, teaching, and writing and what he gets out of each. He is directly involved in several climbing fatalities and yet continues climbing putting up many extremely difficult first ascents in Alaska. He examines his changing attitudes about the risks of climbing while reasessing the impacts the fatalities have had on his life and more importantly the families involved.
Here we have a 62 year old who is looking back over his life, feeling pride over his accomplishments (justly deserved), shame over past behavior, and struggling through career choices, which can help all of us with our own moments of self evaluation.

From reading Roberts' other books, I have wanted to know more about him. In this book, he shares his life with us, from the complexities of relationships with women to lifelong friendships he has made with the likes of Jon Krakauer, all interwoven with amazing climbing stories from Colorado to Alaska. Well written, and like usual, I kept a dictionary handy.

Wow! Having read many climbing narratives and essays, I was expecting more of the same--exciting adventure writing similar to war accounts. David Roberts' newest book has all the first-person nail-biting drama, of course, of putting up world-class routes in frozen wilderness, but the surprise here is the intelligent, unflinching inner dialogue off the mountain. Roberts has seen and experienced high risk, death and deprivation, has lost and gained much from his chosen battles, and has explored the consequences here in an amazingly conscious way. This rare book sheds a great deal of light on the reasons Roberts was drawn away from the safe, tame and mundane 'everydayness' of modern life, even as he fought the demons that drew him away from his quests, even as he became aware of the spreading ripples that emanated from his passion for the climbing life. Undoubtedly these internal struggles rage inside many who try to balance a burning love for earth's wild and dangerous places (climbers, explorers, kayakers, surfers...) against the tidal pull of human relations.

David Roberts (born in 1943) is a climber, mountaineer, author and, notably, past-professor at (hippieish) Hampshire College. In this book he looks back at his life to explain why, despite extreme danger, he chooses to climb. Roberts takes readers through events of his young adulthood, including his first romance (and impregnation, no surprise considering the pair's cluelessness about conception and contraception) and the tragic death of friends, twice, on climbs with him. The first occurred just after the two graduated from high school, the second, four years later. He also talks about his relationship with his wife, Sharon, his famous inventor father, and, especially, his mountaineering friends. By the end of the book, readers learn the approximate odds of dying during a climb over 8,000 feet and the fact that, as he's grown older, Roberts has made new interests, but kept the old. A deep thinker, he provides plenty of robust vocabulary and includes intriguing excerpts from famous stories and poems about climbing as well as important historical information on the subject that help put things in perspective.

Even for non-mountaineer types like me (my biggest climbing accomplishment being Mt Fuji, a total walkup, though during a nonstop rain storm...ought I not get credit for that) OtRBLaD, well written with wonderful imagery, is a marvelous memoir about mountaineering. One of the book's highlights is the appearance, nearly three-quarters through, of my favorite adventure writer, Jon Krakauer (though I'll be rethinking that after reading Roberts), who attended Hampshire College because of its mountaineering classes, climbed (and still climbs) with Roberts. Also good: anything by Jon Krakauer (especially Into Thin Air), Miracle in the Andes by Nando Parrado and Vince Rause, and The Perfect Storm by Sebastian Junger.

Like Clint Eastwood's early "spaghetti westerns", Roberts's memoir is a too long, but generally fascinating narrative replete with seemingly numberless dead bodies, and one terribly misused girl, about whom the "hard man" protagonist shows remarkably little feeling.
Let me acknowledge: I'm not a climber. I LOVE mountains, especially the world above timberline, and like Roberts I was awed by Maurice Herzog's Annapurna in my youth and by the accounts of Hillary and Tenzing - and earlier Mallory - on Everest. But my fear of heights - and perhaps good sense - have limited me to the walk-ups like Mt. Elbert which Roberts ridicules.
Let me also ackowledge why Roberts's memoir troubles me so much. One of the finest young men I taught and coached in prep school was lost in a crevasse on Shishapangma in 1996. He was a 3rd year med student who had very limited climbing experience, yet the expedition leaders never acknowledged that he should not have been allowed to proceed solo between camps at 21,000'. To me his loss epitomizes the awful waste of life on mountains and the callous attitude of those like Roberts who encourage neophytes beyond their capacities and seem to feel no genuine remorse.
The major drawback of this memoir, for the general reader, simply from a story-telling point of view, is its far too-long descriptions of many of Roberts's Alaskan climbs. Serious climbers may revel in the details of carabineers (I may or may not have spelled it right - and don't care) and route-finding and the like - almost minute by minute at times, but non-climbers will become weary and bored. With some skimming of those sections, I persevered to the end. Roberts's narrative style is, otherwise, effective plus I had to find out if he really was as hard and cold and short of compassion as steely-eyed Clint Eastwood. Yup. But, hey, telling about all the dead, and about "Lisa", will bring Roberts a few dollars more, right?

I loved this book.
Roberts put succinctly and eloquently into words what a climber feels before a challenging climb, during a climb and, unfortunately, after the death of a partner on a climb.
As he continues to climb and explore today, Roberts carries along in his hip pocket the deaths of three friends - the most influential of which is his childhood friend, Gabe.
As you read the autobiography, you learn to understand, along with Roberts, the great impact the young kid's fall from the the Flatirons near Boulder, CO and death had on Roberts now as an over-the-hill-climber.
His visits with the sister and friend of Gabe later in life present some very electrifying conclusions. I won't explain what he learns from these two interviews, but it is moving.
As a very amateur climber myself, I could totally relate to his ruminations.
I usually take my used books directly into Hastings for credit on new books - not so this one. I have kept it on my shelf for future reference and inspiration.

An introspective recap of a climbing life by a pioneer in the field. Wonderfully written, with a lot of humanity.