Mountaineering Ethics

1138 Words3 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Everest

Jon Krakauer’s personal account of the 1996 Mount Everest tragedy in which eight climbers perished, Into Thin Air, addresses the tenacious nature of climbers and their unrelenting desire to reach their goal – the summit. This strong ambition ultimately tests the climbers’ concerns with other elements of life such as family, environmental responsibility and moral judgement, all of which are endangered by their individual desire to reach the summit. Whilst the climbers are undeniably selfishly driven to the summit, Krakauer’s retrospective account of the expedition suggests that the climbers were concerned and aware of the damaging consequences of their pursuits but acting on this concern was over-shadowed by a compulsion to explore the mystique of Everest.

Krakauer admits that he didn’t accept his invitation to Hall’s Adventure Consultants expedition for the magazine article, but rather to fulfil his own “burning ambition”. Personal drive and ambition resonates with all of the climbers featured in Krakauer’s personal account, as they pay $65,000 each for a shot at the summit and give up work and family for the following months.

Jon Krakauer agrees to climb Mount Everest despite his wife pleading otherwise because he is “in the grip of the Everest mystique”, highlighting a climber’s ability to shirk his family responsibilities for mountaineering purposes. When discussing the possibility of death on Everest his wife, Linda, states that “it’s not just you who’ll pay the price...Doesn’t that matter to you?” Krakauer’s response, “don’t be melodramatic” certainly indicates that at the time of his obsession with Everest, he was casting aside the impact his climbing had on others. Scott Fischer also demonstrates unbalanced priorities, ...

... middle of paper ...

...he results of commercialisation and increased tourism. Grotesque images of toilets “overflowing with excrement” and the lodge being “an open sewer” communicate the awful implications of overwhelming tourism and bountiful expeditions. Also, Krakauer makes a note of the rubbish accumulated on Everest but he points out how Scott Fischer “removed 5,000 pounds of trash from the mountain”. Fischer’s awareness of the pollution on the mountain further suggests that the climbers do hold themselves accountable for environmental damage. Whilst they may selfishly continue to contribute to commercialisation in spite of the obvious environmental implications, they seem meticulously aware of the harm they are causing and, in Fischer’s case, attempt to reduce the impact of their need to climb (as it’s impossible for them to stop climbing, they do what they can to fit around this).

Show More
Related

  • Jon Krakauer Everest Chapter Summary

    1601 Words  | 4 Pages

    Chapter 7: In chapter 7 Krakauer talks about how Everest has changed from a professionals trek to anyone's trek. He explains that many inexperienced people have climbed Mount Everest with the help of sherpas and guides. He also mentions about the determination of Everest and how in some instances in history people who weren't allowed into Tibet or Nepal but they snuck in and managed to climb and summit Everest

    Read More

  • Within Reach: My Everest Story By Mark Pfetzer And Jack Galvin

    453 Words  | 1 Pages

    In the memoir Within Reach: My Everest Story by Mark Pfetzer and Jack Galvin, the author Mark Pfetzer is faced with an extremely amazing yet scary challenge of climbing Mount Everest. Each event is the story has something to do with the nature that is around them at that moment but Pfetzer shows the readers that nature can be a way of life.

    Read More

  • Character Analysis Of Robert Krakauer's Into Thin Air

    1139 Words  | 3 Pages

    Abstract: Krakauer attempts to figure out exactly what went wrong and what happened to whom. He does extensive research and painstakingly traces the actions of every climber on the mountain. He theorizes about the breakdowns of the expedition, and attributes the disaster to a series of small mistakes. He includes himself, and explicitly blames himself for at least one person's death. The experience affects him profoundly, and in addition to telling the story, the book focuses on how Krakauer is forever changed as a result of what happened.

    Read More

  • Chris Mccandless Foolishness

    1105 Words  | 3 Pages

    He acted on his thrill and was not being rational. When he got home from his adventure through Arizona he decided that his trip was so freeing he wanted to go on another one. This time he would tackle Alaska. In preparation for his trip to Alaska “he donated the $20,000 in his bank account to Oxfam, loaded up his car, and disappeared. From then on he scrupulously avoided contacting either of his parents or Carnie, the sister for whom he purportedly cared immensely” (Krakauer 8).

    Read More

  • Greed In Into Thin Air

    573 Words  | 2 Pages

    The cost for a guide to bring someone up the mountain can be upwards to $70,000. People wanted to go regardless of their health and condition and guides would just do their job and just lead people up without knowing if they are weak or not ready for the climb.”Why did veteran Himalayan guides keep moving upward, ushering a gaggle of relatively inexperienced amateurs […] into an apparent death trap?”(Krakauer 8). This quote is an example of how the guides treat the people climbing up the mountain with the. They disregard the condition and state the people are and just keeping leading them up asking or knowing if they are weak and not ready for the climb up. Not only is this part of guide’s fault for people becoming injured or dead it is also the person’s fault for not thinking about themselves and the state and condition they are in to try to climb up the mountain.”It can't be stressed enough, moreover, that Hall, Fischer, and the rest of us were forced to make such critical decisions while severely impaired with hypoxia”(Krakauer 285). Jon Krakauer is responsible for some of the deaths of people mentioned in the book because of the decisions he made. Krakauer himself said he had guilt for not fully helping the people with hypoxia. The timing and decisions he made for descending back down also did play a role in how he caused some people to die instead of helping

    Read More

  • The Good Life in Epic Narratives

    3414 Words  | 7 Pages

    Classic literature juxtaposes two ways of life that illustrate the poles of true happiness: a life of adventure, exemplified by Odysseus (The Odyssey), and the life at home, which poets and farmers represent. In The Iliad, Achilleus chooses to live a short, glorious life, even though he could have chosen to live a long life in anonymity. Arguments have been put forth that the life of adventure is a living hell, as Achilleus testifies from Hades after his death - in hindsight, he would have settled for the life of a slave and given up his glory, if only he could have lived longer. Alternately, the life of the (metaphorical) farmer has been despised as simple and ordinary, when true immortality is only attained with great accomplishments, such as sacking Troy or surviving heroic adventures which are then recorded. In a modern day autobiography of the 1996 ascent of Mt. Everest (Sagarmatha to the Nepalis, or “goddess of the sky”), Jon Krakauer reveals the human motivation behind adventure and tells the story of the men and women who lived and died on the expeditions to the summit during that spring (Into Thin Air). With epic literature and a recent epic, I will illuminate the values of a reflective life as well as the life of adventure, and delve into the necessary components of the ‘good life.’

    Read More

  • Thematic Connections: Into Thin Air By Jon Krakauer

    209 Words  | 1 Pages

    Throughout the novel, the protagonist encounters many difficulties when trying to reach his goal of climbing Mount Everest. He encounters problems, from illnesses to deaths but most affectively the catastrophic weather. When Krakauer’s 5 friends die, including Rob Hall, Krakauer takes responsibility of the other climbers and helps them get through the tough weather safely. When they arrived to the base camps, many of the climbers gave up but Krakauer kept trying, he was motivated by Halls death to reach the top of Mount Everest. Krakauer finds ways to get around

    Read More

  • Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

    635 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...increasingly anxious “because “[he] had no radio nor any other means of communicating with the outside world “(140). Krakauer’s dire need of assistance helps him recognize that he needs contact with the outside world to not only survive but to relive his innate desire of belonging. Likewise, Krakauer states “ at such moments [climbing the mountain ] something resembling happiness actually stirs in your chest, but it isn’t the sort of emotion you want to lean on very hard”(143) he implies the rush he gets from climbing mountains is not fully fulfilling and reliable; he needs part of the happiness to come from friendships and relationships.

    Read More

  • Survival In Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air

    923 Words  | 2 Pages

    The novel "Into Thin Air" by Jon Krakauer, he writes about an experience that changes his life when Outside magazine asks him to write an article about the commercialism of Mount Everest, he knew from that moment that he needed to climb the mountain. But of course his expedition does not go as expected. On May 10th Krakauer reaches the summit after a extremely stressful and treacherous trek up, but only to have to scale down the mountain with his team in one of the most dangerous seasons in the history of Everest. Many things went wrong when they came down the mountain and throughout this book, Jon attempts to evaluate what exactly happened and how things went wrong. He researches and figures out every person actions on that mountain. He has speculations about the failures of the expedition, and blames the catastrophe due to a series of little

    Read More

  • Jon Krakauer's Use of Ethos, Logos and Pathos When Writting Into the Wild

    1084 Words  | 3 Pages

    An essential part of Krakauer's argument rests upon convincing the reader that he has the authority to accurately interpret the facts of McCandless’s life. His attempt begins in chapter fourteen, where his main focus is explaining why he thinks McCandless did not go to Alaska seeking death. Krakauer establishes his credibility by drawing upon his own experiences and comparing them to McCandless’s. “If something captured my undisciplined imagination, I pursued it with a zeal bordering on obsession...” (134). This passion, he believes, is the same feeling McCandless felt while traveling across the country. At age 23, only a year younger than McCandless at the time he went to Alaska, Krakauer's preferred thrill was mountain climbing (135). During ...

    Read More

  • Critical Analysis Of Into The Wild By Jon Krakauer

    808 Words  | 2 Pages

    According to what McCandless was trying to say, “It is easy, when you are young, to believe that what you desire is no less than what you deserve, to assume that if you want something badly enough, it is your God-given right to have it” (Krakauer 155). Similarly, Krakauer stated that, “When I decided to go to Alaska that April, like Chris McCandless, I was a raw youth who mistook passion for an insight and acted according to an obscure, gap-ridden logic” (155). He presumed that if he climbed the Devils Thumb, then it would fix everything that was wrong with his life. Krakauer said that, “In the end, of course, it changed almost nothing. But I came to appreciate that mountains make poor receptacles for dreams. And I lived to tell my tale” (155). However, McCandless did not come to that realization and unfortunately did not live to tell his

    Read More

  • Analysis Of Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air

    708 Words  | 2 Pages

    Imagine feeling guilty for making it out alive on a journey. In the nonfiction novel, Into Thin Air, by Jon Krakauer, he documents his journey to the summits of Mount Everest and ultimately accuses himself of holding responsible for the disaster on the mountain. After realizing only one-fourth of the people that climbed to the summits on May 10, 1996, made it back down to base camp alive, Krakauer theorizes why that was so. He attributes most of the reason for the disaster to the erratic weather, along with hubris, who wanted the thought of leading a group to the mountain. Despite those reasons, there is no ultimate reason for the deaths documented in the book, but bottom line the climbers that died didn’t thoroughly comprehend the danger they were going to encounter as a consequence that contributed to the disaster.

    Read More

  • Into Thin Air: Rob Hall

    1185 Words  | 3 Pages

    Everest is an unbelievable mountain that has taken the lives of a number of the greatest climbers in history. It was my job to ensure that clients make it up that treacherous mountain safely. My name is Rob Hall. I was the main guide and cofounder of a climbing company called Adventure Consultants. My friend, Gary Ball, and I used to be professional climbers. Together we succeeded in climbing to the highest summit on each of the seven continents in seven months. This was our greatest achievement. After this, we decided to start our own company guiding clients up large mountains. In May 1992, we successfully led six clients to the summit of Everest. Unfortunately, Gary died of cerebral edema in October 1993 during an attempt on the world’s sixth-tallest mountain. He died in my arms and the next day I buried him in a crevasse. Despite the pain that his death had caused me, I continued guiding for our company and eventually led thirty-nine climbers to the summit of Everest.

    Read More

  • A Personal Narrative: Hikinging Up A Mountain

    735 Words  | 2 Pages

    I almost fell off a cliff on the side of a mountain. I was in Pitkin, Colorado, on a camping trip during the summer of 2009. The trees were green, the air was fresh so were the lakes, rivers, and ponds were stocked with fish and wildlife was everywhere. Usually, on these camping trips, I would be accompanied by a large number of people. However, this time, it was just my parents, my three brothers, and my two sisters. I was almost 12 years old at the time and having three older brothers made me very competitive. Naturally, when my family decided to climb one of the mountain’s which were around us, I wanted to be the first one to reach its peak.

    Read More

  • Comparing Fischer and Hall

    685 Words  | 2 Pages

    ...to wherever they were and make sure they were treated. He also ignores his own disease and ill condition to insure the clients have a shot at the summit. This may be viewed as foolishness but this type of self-sacrifice is something rare and admirable. In conclusion, both men have a usual connection to climbing.

    Read More

More about Mountaineering Ethics

Open Document