Into Thin Air

For second quarter I decided to read the autobiography of Jon Krakauer Into Thin Air. After hearing so many great reviews I decided to read it myself, and trust me this book didn’t disappoint. When Krakauer was asked to climb Mount Everest by a man named Rob Hall who at the time was a famous climber, he was enthralled. Being one of his childhood dreams that suddenly seemed like it would become true, he had no choice   but to say yes. Though Rob Hall was a very experienced climber, he didn’t have much practice with high altitude climbing and felt like it would all be the same. What they didn’t know was, that their was a huge storm brewing up on Everest. When it first hit, it left the climbers with loads of confusion. This storm, that came rolling in at the same time the climbers were on their course for the peak, has been known as the worst in Everest’s history. Five people died during this tragedy, and they weren’t just average tourists wanting to climb the world’s tallest mountain either. All five (Rob Hall, Andy Harris, Scott Fischer, Yasuko Namba and Doug Hansen) were considered some of the worlds top climbers. This just makes me realize that mother nature is very unpredictable and shouldn’t be messed around with.

Krakauer, while writing this book explains that trust to these climbers is shown through loyalty of one another. While climbing everest, loyalty means that a climber will risk their own life to help someone else. the way that a guide treats his group would be know as loyalty, and those guides and clients that are closest to each other are often result of the loyalty shown through the guide. ex. Lopsang Sherpa is extremely loyal to Fishcer, because when Fischer was lost on the summit, Lopsang’s search for fischer was not dulled, even by the deadly weather. Similar to Lopsang, Hall is very loyal to Hansen, when he refuses to leave Hansen at the summit. His loyalty towards Hansen eventually results in his death, even when he had the chance to climb down and save himself. Being loyal in life is a very good way to create bonds among people that can’t be broken even if the result is possible death. Having loyalty in life towards a person can create an everlasting friendship among someone that you can always count on 

The story also really iterates on a very important lesson that things are just set up for failure. When the Himalayas were first truly discovered, the indigenous mountain towns that resided there kept professionals off the mountain to preserve its natural beauty and magnificence. But as time went along and the economies of these beginning towns began to drop and fall apart, they had no choice but to start charging high prices for people that wanted to climb this wonder of the world. With no requirements of skill, and a vast expansion of publicity towards the mountain, people of all sorts wanted to say they climbed the tallest mountain in the world. these all walks of life, most with little to no skill of climbing at all managed to purchase there way to the mountain. With those actually being experienced enough to climb Everest were kicked off due to lack of funds. With this pattern of declination of skilled climbers and the increase of mediocre climbers, brought with them the increased death rate. Showing today that our world can be very corrupt and not always have its idealism on the right course, such as making money over saving the lives of people.

The audience that this book was being emphasized towards was practically everyone that had the skill to read a somewhat challenging book like this one. Krakauer may have had the intention to teach people that even if you are imaged to have tons of power, and somehow always seem like you know what you are doing, you can screw up. With the five that ignored their personal instincts on evacuating the summit to safety is a life lesson on how people that seem to know everything, still make bad decisions that cost them their lives. I believe the main purpose behind this book was for it to be a teaching lesson towards everyone. No matter who you are, and how experienced you are can still put you into life threatening situations.

My overall aspirations of this book receives some of the highest ratings I’ve ever shown towards a book today. With a unique writing style that knows how to tell a very interesting tale, but teach you very important life lessons that can be learned no matter how old you are isn’t easily mastered. Through this book brought up much controversy, I still think Jon should be well respected. Im thankful that I read this book, and would certainly recommend it to someone else.