Book review

THE WORLD BENEATH THEIR FEET

SCOTT ELLSWORTH

by Brian Goldman

For nearly a century, elite English climbers from Oxford and Cambridge dominated mountaineering. Thirty-one out of 36 peaks in the Alps were first climbed by the English. In 1865, the Matterhorn was first climbed by an Englishman, wearing cotton parkas, woolen sweaters, hobnailed leather boots, while using canvas expedition tents and kerosene stoves. Imagine—no avalanche beacons; no weather reports delivered by satellite phone; no oxygen systems; no lightweight packs; few maps or photographs.

These were different times indeed, confirmed by the clothes they wore and the books they carried. Eric Shipton, who attempted to climb Mt. Everest numerous times, wore “seven sweaters, two pairs of woolen trousers, five pairs of socks, one pair of woolen mittens, sheepskin gauntlets, a windproof suit, and a balaclava helmet.” He wrote that he felt like a “fully-rigged deepsea diver for dancing a tango.” In his pack, he carried and read by flickering candlelight Thornton Wilder’s The Bridge of San Luis Rey, a novel that questioned the meaning of life in the face of the sudden collapse of an ancient rope bridge in 18th-century Peru. Later, climbers carried, among other heavy tomes, the Oxford Book of Greek Verse or The Brothers Karamazov.

However, as tension steadily rose between European powers in the 1930s, a different kind of battle was already raging across the Himalayas. Teams of mountaineers from Great Britain, Nazi Germany, and the United States were all competing to be the first to climb the world's highest peaks, the Achttausender— 8000-meter peaks, including Mt. Everest and K2. Amazingly, and against all odds, these audacious, determined climbers went higher than anyone could have imagined. In the corridors of the Third Reich, officials soon discovered the propaganda value of planting a Nazi flag on top of the world's highest mountains. The race was on.

Author Scott Ellsworth has written a history of survival, technological innovation, and breathtaking human physical achievement—all set against the backdrop of a world headed toward war—that became one of the most compelling international dramas of the 20th century. The level of detail in this book is exceptional; however, some readers may find it too dense and repetitive. Although the reader is left wondering about the inner psyche of climbers so willing to risk their lives to summit, each chapter is an extremely detailed account of the preparation, routes, and challenges of mountains such as Minya Konka, Nanga Parbat, Nanda Devi, Siniolchu, Kangchenjunga, K2, and Mt. Everest, among others.

We learn of a somewhat unstable, ambitious English eccentric named Maurice Wilson, a machine gunner near Ypres during WWI, who set out for Tibet in order to climb Mt. Everest alone. He got a pilot’s license, purchased a plane, and, by dead reckoning, attempted to crash land on a glacier as near to Mt. Everest as possible. He and others from the Lost Generation, unfettered by convention—the Jack Kerouacs of their time, unabashedly compelled by demons or wanderlust or fame—were only too willing to risk life and limb to climb these mountains.

Climbers were the rock stars of their generation. They were mobbed at train stations and featured in movies and plays. James Hilton created the mythical land of Shangri-La in Lost Horizon. Heinrich Harrar, an SS officer, climbed the north face of the Eiger in 1938 along with fellow climbers Heckmair, Vorg, and Kasparek, all while being followed by an airplane, radio broadcasts, and onlookers with binoculars at nearby Grindelwald.

Each expedition—failed or successful— is a thrilling chapter. Which one would collapse under an avalanche? What new innovations would make these 8,000-meter peaks more accessible? By 1933, Russians, Italians, Japanese, Americans, and French all began to climb in earnest. Each nation traveled in a different style. For example, “the French expedition of 1936 to Hidden Peak carried eight tons of supplies, including 72 fillettes of champagne, countless tins of foie gras, and employed 670 porters and 36 high-altitude Sherpas. However, in spite of this nourishment, the monsoon came three weeks early, pounding the camps with snow; climbing was finished.”

Tibet became of strategic value between Great Britain and the Third Reich. Back door military activity could be brought upon British India from the north, tying up troops and supplies. Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS, also believed Aryans, a blond, blue-eyed super race, had pockets living in the Himalayas that he wanted to find.

Ellsworth’s telling of the actual first summit of Mt. Everest was a joint accomplishment of respected equals: Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hillary. However, he reminds the reader that the British were housed in their embassy, with its plush carpets and billiards, while the Sherpas slept in stalls, given smaller rations, and were told to return their expedition gear rather than keeping it, as was the custom. Tenzing, who was said to have a “third lung” because he was able to climb so easily, saved Hillary’s life when he nearly fell into a crevasse. Little known fact—half the porters were women who each carried up to 50 pounds.

Included in World Beneath Their Feet are historical photos, short biographical profiles of the climbers from this era, and also a glossary of mountaineering terms that help a novice understand the complex, impossibly difficult world of climbing.

Coming soon to the Mazama Library.