The Ultimate Challenge
The Ultimate Challenge: The Hardest Way up the Highest M ountain in the World, by Christian Bonington. New Y ork: Stein and D ay P ub lishers, 1973. 352 pages, 24 color plates, 31 black-and-white plates, 6 line drawings, 1 pull-out map. $12.50. Some climbers take M ount Everest very seriously and rightly so. The British pioneered, climbed, measured, lavished a treasure, and knighted men for reaching the summit. Most of all they w rote and read about it. Chris Bonington has w ritten an expeditionary book that may enrage the young turks of the climbing world, and at the same time engage the older generation in the possibilities of smaller expeditions to Everest. This last was illegally dem onstrated by an American, W oodrow Wilson Sayre, w ith a four-m an climbing party in 1963. Bonington sounds a bit wistful about Sayre’s attem pt when he comments, “But I wonder. There are quite a few mountaineers to-day who are beginning to feel that this type of expedition is true m ountaineering … there is a certain appeal in the thought of man, unaided, reaching the summ it of Everest.” H ere lies the dichotom y of Bonington’s philosophy, “idealism and m a terialism .” Bonington uses all the standard multi-media devices to write his story. H e gives short but tantalizing glimpses of the Japanese expedition (whose leader was seventy years of age) which failed in 1969-70. His account of D yhrenfurth’s International Expedition of 1971, gives little-known (to the less voracious reader) inform ation about the actual conception of this expedition by John A m att and Leif Patterson. His sum m ary of the E uropean Everest Expedition in the spring of 1972, gives scary in sights into the notorious Dr. Herrligkoffer. This section tries to give both sides of the story by using the writings of D oug Scott and Felix Kuen. Scott’s prose shines like a beacon, as indeed it does throughout the entire book, including his writing in the appendix. Bonington freely admits “The first I had heard the Southwest Face of Everest m entioned as a possible objective was in the sum m er of 1965. I was climbing with John H arlin, the A m erican climber … (w ho) also talked of the Southwest Face of Everest, dream ing of an International Expedition.” Bonington displays his idealism by giving credit, not only to John H arlin (a m an m uch misunderstood, especially in his own co u n try ), but to all concerned with this expedition.
Bonington devotes about 87 pages to background m aterial. I would have welcomed m ore historical background, especially his shortened ac counts of solo attem pts on Mt. Everest. A pproxim ately 14 pages are used, telling the reader of the change in plans from a small expedition via the South Col route, to the “all-out assault on the Southwest Face of Everest” , and the hurried preparations which enabled him to “fling the expedition together in approxim ately eight weeks.” H e waits until page 113 to tell us that if he had com pleted his com puter program m ing, “we should have discovered, back in England, that we didn’t have the logistic pow er to establish a seventh cam p.” The section that describes the approach m arch is enlivened by a line drawing by Dave Bathgate. Bonington’s observations concerning the changes in the countryside and people are perceptive. However, the inclusion of 100 Yale locks in the expeditionary equipm ent tells us m uch more about some of the changes that have taken place. It is here also that we m eet the unfortunate Tony Tighe, a m em ber of Advance Base, who lost his life at the end of the expedition in the icefall. John H u n t writes in the forw ard, “this sad episode falls outside the context of the Expedition itself.” The bulk of the book (approxim ately 140 pages) uses diaries, per sonal letters, tape-recorded monologues, and radio conversations, to tell the story of the broken tents, impossible winds, unbearable cold, oxygen problems, and the attitudes of the climbers. A n extract from one of Doug Scott’s letters is indicative of the clim bers’ feelings at one point on the climb, “We all w ant to get up and off— H am ish, Dougal, Mick, and me— all prepared to rush it out of the way.” Despite this statem ent w ritten on the 6th of October, the final w ord was w ritten early in November, by the man who often in the past has had the final word. Dougal H aston writes of the final push, “The wind— always the wind, was viciously asserting its authority … I had experienced many bad storms, m any high winds, but this was a new dimension of wind speed … I reached the position w here the equipm ent was dum ped and at just above that point the wind stopped gusting and moved into con tinuous m ovem ent … two things were blatantly self-evident. There was no way we could attem pt to climb on the rock band and no way a tent could be pitched… There was nothing to do but turn aro u n d …" This reviewer will leave Bonington’s five-and-one-half page conclusion to those who wish to read the book. Photographs are adequate, and some of them are m ore like character portraits. The appendices are eminently readable, particularly Jim m y R obert’s notes on Sherpa per form ance from 1924-1972. This is Bonington’s fourth book, and the w onder is how he can m aintain his hectic schedule. The book shows hurried mistakes that could have been remedied by an alert editor. Bonington may have missed the implacable gentleness of D ougal H aston, and he may have dismissed
the outstanding hum or and thoughtfulness of Mick Burke. H e may have w ritten too lightly of the im portance of a professional nurse, Beth Burke, in residence at Base Camp. H e may have failed to com m unicate the essential personality of m any of the people on the expedition, b u t like the climb itself the book is a gallant attem pt. C h a r l e s H. K n a p p
Bonington devotes about 87 pages to background m aterial. I would have welcomed m ore historical background, especially his shortened ac counts of solo attem pts on Mt. Everest. A pproxim ately 14 pages are used, telling the reader of the change in plans from a small expedition via the South Col route, to the “all-out assault on the Southwest Face of Everest” , and the hurried preparations which enabled him to “fling the expedition together in approxim ately eight weeks.” H e waits until page 113 to tell us that if he had com pleted his com puter program m ing, “we should have discovered, back in England, that we didn’t have the logistic pow er to establish a seventh cam p.” The section that describes the approach m arch is enlivened by a line drawing by Dave Bathgate. Bonington’s observations concerning the changes in the countryside and people are perceptive. However, the inclusion of 100 Yale locks in the expeditionary equipm ent tells us m uch more about some of the changes that have taken place. It is here also that we m eet the unfortunate Tony Tighe, a m em ber of Advance Base, who lost his life at the end of the expedition in the icefall. John H u n t writes in the forw ard, “this sad episode falls outside the context of the Expedition itself.” The bulk of the book (approxim ately 140 pages) uses diaries, per sonal letters, tape-recorded monologues, and radio conversations, to tell the story of the broken tents, impossible winds, unbearable cold, oxygen problems, and the attitudes of the climbers. A n extract from one of Doug Scott’s letters is indicative of the clim bers’ feelings at one point on the climb, “We all w ant to get up and off— H am ish, Dougal, Mick, and me— all prepared to rush it out of the way.” Despite this statem ent w ritten on the 6th of October, the final w ord was w ritten early in November, by the man who often in the past has had the final word. Dougal H aston writes of the final push, “The wind— always the wind, was viciously asserting its authority … I had experienced many bad storms, m any high winds, but this was a new dimension of wind speed … I reached the position w here the equipm ent was dum ped and at just above that point the wind stopped gusting and moved into con tinuous m ovem ent … two things were blatantly self-evident. There was no way we could attem pt to climb on the rock band and no way a tent could be pitched… There was nothing to do but turn aro u n d …" This reviewer will leave Bonington’s five-and-one-half page conclusion to those who wish to read the book. Photographs are adequate, and some of them are m ore like character portraits. The appendices are eminently readable, particularly Jim m y R obert’s notes on Sherpa per form ance from 1924-1972. This is Bonington’s fourth book, and the w onder is how he can m aintain his hectic schedule. The book shows hurried mistakes that could have been remedied by an alert editor. Bonington may have missed the implacable gentleness of D ougal H aston, and he may have dismissed
the outstanding hum or and thoughtfulness of Mick Burke. H e may have w ritten too lightly of the im portance of a professional nurse, Beth Burke, in residence at Base Camp. H e may have failed to com m unicate the essential personality of m any of the people on the expedition, b u t like the climb itself the book is a gallant attem pt. C h a r l e s H. K n a p p
