‘Why did you want to climb Everest?’ reporters quizzed mountaineer George Mallory in 1922. That the question even needed asking shows mountaineering is fundamentally different from other pursuits. No journalist would ever ask a footballer why they kick a ball around. But mountaineering is gruelling and you’re way more likely to perish from it than to make a fortune. So why would anyone climb any mountain, let alone Everest? Mallory’s rationale was short and sweet: ‘Because it’s there.’
And what about Jimmy Chin? Why does he climb?
Chin, 48, is part Bear Grylls, part David Attenborough. He has not only climbed snow, ice and rock terrain on all seven continents, he’s also photographed other climbers doing the same and made documentaries for National Geographic. In 2019 he won both an Oscar and a Bafta for Free Solo, a hair-raising account of how his buddy Alex Honnold climbed Yosemite’s El Capitan without a rope.
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