What makes men and women climb high? Most commonly, according to Daniel Light, ‘the prosecution of science or the advancement of empire’. It might also be general flag-waving or just personal fulfilment, as in the case of ‘private traveller’ Godfrey Vigne, who opened his English eyes to the wonder of the Karakoram in the baleful 1930s.
London-based Light – ‘a keen climber, not a serious mountaineer’ – has produced a colourful survey of mostly 19th-century mountaineering across the globe, starting with the geographer and natural philosopher Alexander von Humboldt and his five-year expedition to South America. The baron came back convinced he had got within 1,000ft of the highest point on Earth, then thought to be Chimborazo in Ecuador, and told tales of a strange sickness that came on at altitude: vomiting, dizziness, shortness of breath and bleeding from lips and gums.
The White Ladder, Light’s hugely entertaining book, is divided into four sections, following four types of climbers in a loosely chronological narrative.
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