Into Thin Air Book Review By Charlie Greenberg

Title of the Book: Into Thin Air   Author: Jon Krakauer   # of Pages: 333   Star Rating: ☆☆☆ 

Review:

What is set at the top of the world and has more drama than Keeping Up With the Kardashians?  Into Thin Air is Jon Krakauer’s account of the tragic 1996 climbing season on Mt. Everest.  Krakauer chronicles in great detail the interaction between the personalities of expedition members, intense environmental conditions, and the grueling physical exertion that characterizes expedition climbing. His retelling of the events that led to the deaths of eight climbers, reveals his ambivalence about the role that he and other members played in the loss of life and the permanent damage that this expedition inflicted upon those climbers that survived.  Set in the Himalaya, predominantly on Mount Everest, this story is part adventure travel narrative, part climbing textbook, and part psychological thriller.  Krakauer uses this forum to analyze the events of the 1996 Everest disaster in hindsight, seeking to ascertain how so many lives were lost, his role in the loss of life, and how mountaineering is both a pursuit of the divine as well as a highly flawed and damaging activity that destroys human life as well as the environment.

Much of Into Thin Air is a tribute to the sport of mountaineering.  In his depiction of mountaineering, Krakauer claims “that climbing Mount Everest was primarily about enduring pain …and in subjecting ourselves to week after week of toil, tedium, and suffering, it struck me that most of us were probably seeking, above all else, something like a state of grace” (Krakauer 140).  Krakauer describes the process of climbing, the technical climbing gear, and psychology of climbing in great detail.  His devotion to and experience with the sport is engaging and creates a feeling of religious practice.  He loves the mountains and describes the beauty of Mount Everest and the surrounding Himalaya with a naturalist’s eye.  Also with a commitment to detail, he gives background information about the local Sherpa culture in order to reveal the book’s setting and some of the characters.   Krakauer explores the external characteristics and internal motivations of the other climbers on Everest.  Such attention to detail is riveting if not problematic.

Yet, Krakauer’s account of the 1996 expeditions and their members is also damaged by his own personal feelings about the event.  Krakauer claims that “of course for some Everesters myriad other, less virtuous, motives came into play, as well, minor celebrity, career advancement, ego massage, ordinary bragging rights, filthy lucre” (Krakauer 140). He criticizes the commercialization of Everest, the selfish motivations of his fellow climbers and their lack of experience, the ego-driven decisions of his guides, and what he seems to think is the simpleness of the Sherpas.  He is judgmental and does not seem to understand his role in the events of the expedition though he tries to explain himself in the epilogue.  Though Krakauer reflects deeply on others, he does not seem to reflect on himself.  He does not seem to see that the criticism that he has for his fellow climbers accurately describes him.  An example is that he condemns the commercialization of Everest yet he is a journalist whose story intent was to brings more climbers to Everest.  His harsh criticism hurts and angers those climbers who survived and damages the reputations and memories of those who died.  The anger, petty quarreling, and finger pointing of the narrative reads, at times, like reality T.V. 

This book is powerful for it’s analysis of a high profile event, its armchair adventure on the slopes of Everest, and its deep look at the psyche of climbers in some of the most extreme conditions in the world.  Whether you are glad you are not there or you wish your next hike was the beginning of the road to the summit of Everest, Into Thin Air is worth the vicarious exhilaration and sadness that reading it evokes.