Krakauer writes in his postscript “DeWalt-who oversaw the research, wrote The Climb, and has assumed the role of Boukreev’s spokesman-undertook the derogation of Into Thin Air with notable energy and enthusiasm. Their book, The Climb, hit the shelves later in 1997. All the same, Boukreev took his perspective to print through the author G. There was also the traffic jam at Hillary Step, where three expeditions bottlenecked and frittered away precious time on summit day. Perhaps most importantly, the decision of Rob Hall (leader of the Adventure Consultants expedition of which Krakauer was a member) not to turn his climbers back from the summit at the prearranged go-back time. I will say that Krakauer doesn't lay all of the blame at Boukreev's feet and my main takeaway from his account was that many factors led to the fatal outcome. Into Thin Air suggests that Boukreev abandoned climbers he should have shepherded on the deadly descent from the summit. If there's a theme to Into Thin Air, it's delirium.Īnatoli Boukreev, a guide for Scott Fischer's Mountain Madness expedition which attempted the summit on the same day as Krakauer's, hated his portrayal in the book. The memories of each participant are made somewhat suspect by the pernicious effects of altitude, which does strange and terrible things to the human psyche. Like many arguments, the core of it is a disagreement on basic facts: Who was where when, who talked to whom, and whether conversations actually happened. I expected a sober description of the tragedy and to get a sense of what it's like to go for the highest summit in the world, but the ending gives way to an acrimonious fight over the narrative.

The book is clearly and movingly written, but I was amazed while reading the postscript just how controversial it appeared to be (and probably still is) after its release. The book is Krakauer's account of the disaster on Mount Everest in May, 1996, where eight climbers died over the span of a day.

I'm about to give away some of the story, so there's my warning if you want to read it first. I finished reading Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer a couple days ago. We live entirely, especially if we are writers, by the imposition of a narrative line upon disparate images, by the “ideas” with which we have learned to freeze the shifting phantasmagoria which is our actual experience. We interpret what we see, select the most workable of the multiple choices. Available as a podcast on Spotify: We tell ourselves stories in order to live.… We look for the sermon in the suicide, for the social or moral lesson in the murder of five.

Jon krakauer everest