Everest Reconnaissance: The First Expedition of 1921

by George Mallory, Charles Howard-Bury

Charles Howard-Bury led the first official reconnaisance expedition to Everest in 1921. This is the account of that journey with George Mallory and others to investigate approaches to the world's highest and until then largely inaccessible mountain.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Mountaineering

256 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1922

About the author

George Leigh Mallory was an English schoolteacher and mountaineer. He was educated at Winchester College and Magdalene College, Cambridge, where he read history under the tutelage of A.C. Benson and wrote a biography of James Boswell. While at Cambridge, Mallory developed close friendships with several members of the Bloomsbury Group, including Duncan Grant and Lytton Strachey. He was keenly interested in political issues of the day, and was a Fabian socialist who favored women’s suffrage and Irish home rule. Mallory later worked as a schoolmaster at Charterhouse School, where he taught the future poet Robert Graves. Graves credited Mallory with encouraging his writing and introducing him to the work of modern authors.

Mallory is best known for participating in the three Mount Everest expeditions of the 1920s. Along with Andrew Irvine, he died attempting to be the first to climb Mount Everest. It is not known whether or not they reached the summit before their fatal accident.

Reviews

[Duane Parker · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this book would be boring to most people. I found it interesting because I have had a lifelong interest, a fascination really, of the history of Mount Everest as it relates to climbing. The British were obsessed with the goal of being the first to reach the summit, and they sent 9 organized expeditions to Everest from 1921 to 1953. They finally achieved their goal in 1953 when Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit. This 1921 expedition was for reconnaissance, to find a suitable route to reach the mountain, and then to visually observe a possible route up the mountain itself. One of the climbers on this 1921 expedition was George Leigh Mallory. He found the best possible route and then returned with the 1922 expedition with the first all out attempt to reach the summit. It ended in failure and another expedition was mounted in 1924. Mallory would come to the mountain for the 3rd time and it would end in his death along with his climbing partner, Andrew Irvine. What happened to them was one of the great mysteries of the 20th century. His body was finally found in 1999, 75 years after his death. Whether he and Irvine ever reached the summit remains a mystery, but most experts don't think they did. Andrew Irvine's body was never found.

I say this book about the 1921 expedition would be boring to most because it documents terrain, rivers, glaciers, plants, etc. About 40 percent of the book was written by Mallory and chronicles the advanced exploration, which gave Europeans their first close up view of Mount Everest.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting adventure book. Fun to get a perspective from before Everest was climbed.

A bit too much coverage of the local flora for a casual read.

[Oshun · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an important historical document (400+ pages): the official account of the first British reconnaissance of the slopes of Mount Everest in 1921, preparatory to the serious attempt to reach the summit in 1924. It is well worth reading even in its most turgid parts (and some parts are heavy reading indeed--in particular those written by C. K. Howard-Bury--not because they are difficult or overly technical, but because he is seriously dull writer! Even in those parts, the subject matter triumphs over the writing style.)

By contrast, the parts written by George Mallory are truly a pleasure to read--often quite extraordinary--vivid, lyrical even, but clear, detailed, and comprehensible. With unflagging and earnest enthusiasm, he gives the general reader a sense of the technical problems and the effort required, and communicates the passion, hardships, and dedication of the climbers and their local helpers. If Mallory had survived to tell the tale of his assault on the summit in 1924, from which he tragically never returned, I have no doubt he would have produced a truly a brilliant book--a legitimate classic. Mallory was a skilled, sincere, and impassioned writer; if I did not already have a crush on him this book would have sealed the deal.

[C-shaw]

3/16/17 - I have to abandon this for now, hope to get back to it later.