Everest Calling: Ascent of the Dark Side: The Mallory-Irvine Ridge ...

E verest Calling: A scen t o f the D ark Side: The M allory-Irvine Ridge. L orna Siggins. M ainstream Publishing C om pany, Edinburgh, Scotland. 1994. 191 pages, color and black-and-w hite photographs. £14.99. Everest books tend to em phasize one o f several them es, usually along the lines o f individual or team heroism , or national heroism . W hen D awson Stelfox becam e the first Irishm an to clim b E verest in 1993 via still seldom -clim bed M allory-Irvine (or north ridge) route, he becam e a hero in his hom eland as E verest “conquerors” often do. But Stelfox hails from B elfast in N orthern Ireland, w hich prom pted a rival southern-born Irish m ountaineer m onths later to claim that an Irishm an, “from the south,” still had not clim bed Everest. This book chronicles Stelfox and his team m ates’ fine effort in becoming the first British mountaineers to climb the route upon which George Mallory and Andrew Irvine perished in 1924. Their story mixes a curious, yet intriguing blend of journalism , fine prose, and Irish nationalism. This because the principal author, Lorna Siggins, is a non-climbing journalist from the expedition-sponsoring Irish Times, while the Boardman-Tasker prize-winning writer and expedition member Dermot Somers contributes a string o f fine diary entries. The nationalistic thread running through the book I found rem arkable because, as is stated on page 155, the clim bers felt com pelled to leave not an Irish tricolour, “not a U nion Jack on E v erest’s sum m it … national flags, national anthem s were not in the spirit o f this expedition.” Yet the Irish hom etow ns and ancestral connections o f each team m em ber are dutifully noted, along w ith the Irish ancestry o f additional cast m em bers such as Sir E dm und H illary and John Barry. Oddly, the book was printed in Scotland— but it was m ost certainly w ritten for the Irish m arket. E verest C alling ultim ately stands out because o f S iggins’ and S o m ers’ contrasting w riting styles, from her tight journalism to his flowing, eloquent prose. S iggins’ new spaperly text im proves and gathers speed as you progress; Som ers w rites beautifully about B uddhism , Tibet and the C hinese occupation, paralleling their long-standing history o f political violence w ith his own country’s. O nly an Irish m ountaineer w ould dare m ake an analogy to a bom b alert in a clim bing book! His talent now w idely praised, Som ers is a gifted w riter able to capture the rapture and agony o f clim bing w ith succinct phrases and delightful coloring (page 80): Just ahead, the valley threw out its arms like the nave o f a cathedral in aw e before E verest, and there in the flattening was the R ongbuk M onastery, the highest on earth; only B uddhism could live that high, and probably m akes m ore sense here than it does in D haram sala, Berkeley, CA, or at H yde Park Corner. “A scent o f the D ark Side” though. Why, I w ondered? B ecause the route is north-facing, I suppose, cold and shaded— or was there som e deeper, darker

m irror here reflecting the Irish soul? There are few other shortcom ings. M essner is called “an A ustrian m ountaineer,” and unfortunately the Spanish photo­ graphic reproduction is som etim es blurry. Four photos are also printed backw ards. The best reasons for tracking dow n this book, how ever, are D erm ot S om ers’ excellent w ritings, and the array o f fascinating closeup photographs of the upper section o f E v erest’s N orth R idge, including the Second Step— a route I, too, w ould one day like to climb. E

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