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Mountains of the Mind: A History of a Fascination
 
 
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Mountains of the Mind: A History of a Fascination (Paperback)

by Robert Macfarlane (Author)
4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (20 customer reviews)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 320 pages
  • Publisher: Granta Books; New edition edition (13 May 2004)
  • ISBN-10: 1862076545
  • ISBN-13: 978-1862076549
  • Product Dimensions: 19.2 x 13 x 2.4 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (20 customer reviews)
  • Amazon.co.uk Sales Rank: 117,111 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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    #66 in  Books > Sports, Hobbies & Games > Climbing & Mountaineering > Mountaineering History & Biography

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Product Description

Amazon.co.uk Review
Robert Macfarlane's Mountains of the Mind is the most interesting of the crop of books published to mark the 50th anniversary of the first successful ascent of Everest. Macfarlane is both a mountaineer and a scholar. Consequently we get more than just a chronicle of climbs. He interweaves accounts of his own adventurous ascents with those of pioneers such as George Mallory, and in with an erudite discussion of how mountains became such a preoccupation for the modern western imagination.

The book is organised around a series of features of mountaineering--glaciers, summits, unknown ranges--and each chapter explores the scientific, artistic and cultural discoveries and fashions that accompanied exploration. The contributions of assorted geologists, romantic poets, landscape artists, entrepreneurs, gallant amateurs and military cartographers are described with perceptive clarity. The book climaxes with an account of Mallory's fateful ascent on Everest in 1924, one of the most famous instances of an obsessive pursuit. Macfarlane is well-placed to describe it since it is one he shares.

MacFarlane's own stories of perilous treks and assaults in the Alps, the Cairngorms and the Tian Shan mountains between China and Kazakhstan are compelling. Readers who enjoyed Francis Spufford's masterly I May Be Some Time: Ice and the English Imagination will enjoy Mountains of the Mind. This is a slighter volume than Spufford's and it loses in depth what it gains in range, but for an insight into the moody, male world of mountaineering past and present it is invaluable. --Miles Taylor --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

The Times
'An erudite and fascinating journey...'

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Customer Reviews

20 Reviews
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Average Customer Review
4.4 out of 5 stars (20 customer reviews)
 
 
 
 
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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars A real tour de force, 18 Nov 2003
By Andrew Howell "andyhowell3" (Birmingham, UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   
This review is from: Mountains of the Mind: A History of a Fascination (Hardcover)
This IS one of the most absorbing books I have read for a long time. What is it with our fascination with mountains?

Macfarlane traces western man's fascination with mountains, charting the history of mountains and of the men and women who sought to conquer them. The book is worth the cost alone for the description of Mallory's three expeditions to Everest, here portrayed as a love affair that completes take over his life with disastrous consequences.

But this is more than just a history. This is an examination of fascination and obsession, a journey through the mountains of the imagination.

For anyone who walks or climbs in mountains this book is as Rebecca Solnit's Wanderlust: a history of walking.

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29 of 30 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant; philosophy meets poetry, 25 Jul 2003
This review is from: Mountains of the Mind: A History of a Fascination (Hardcover)
I came on line to write an independent review of this brilliant book, but then I saw the review by the reader from Fort William, and it made me rethink what I was going to say. First of all, it's important to say that this is top-class book; a totally new kind of writing about mountains. Second off, it's not just a book about mountains, but about how history works, why people behave the way they do towards different types of landscapes, how we think the world into being, and what issues like guilt, love and betrayal mean when looked at in historical and not just individual terms. in many ways, this is a book of philosophy and poetry, rather than a history of mountaineering, which is perhaps why some people - including the reviewer from Fort William - have been disappointed. It's obvious that Macfarlne isn't a top-drawer climber; he never says that he is in the book, and anyone who knows anything about serious mountaineering could tell he's not. So there's no secret, or misdescription there. The point is, I think, that eveyrone who goes to the mountains goes to them because, in some sense, they love the way they look, and so this book does answer the big WHY question.

This is all a bit jumbled. But, in conclusion: this is a very special book, in the tradition of writers like Bruce Chatwin and Barry Lopez in the way it works simultaneously with adventures and ideas, and in the way it thinks about the wild, physical world. READ IT if you love history, language or, indeed, mountains.

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20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars The mind has mountains..., 15 Oct 2003
This review is from: Mountains of the Mind: A History of a Fascination (Hardcover)
This stunning, magnificent, elegantly written book is one of the best books I've read this year. Some reviewers are entirely missing the point. Yes, of course it's about mountains and mountaineering - at its basic level. But its real concerns resonate so much more broadly and deeply. It's about history and geology, natural history and philosophy, literature and poetry; and it's about culture and psychology and self-discovery. And ultimately, after a meticulously woven argument bringing all these threads together, it's about tragedy, and about knowledge and about love. As another reviewer acutely observed, Macfarlane, like Hopkins, encounters the particular nature of things, and celebrates it, in language that's enormously potent, imaginative, and wide-ranging in imagery and vocabulary. Yet these writerly techniques never even for one moment get in the way of meaning or accessibility. It's at all times page-turningly readable. And the chapters just get better and better throughout. In short, it's a work of art. I just can't wait for his next book - whatever it's about.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews

3.0 out of 5 stars An eye opening read
If you really want to understand why some are prepared to risk everything for nothing, then read this book. Read more
Published 5 months ago by M. Glen

5.0 out of 5 stars Awesome!
Mountains of the mind is a beautifully written thought provoking book.

Robert Macfarlanes writting flowed effortlessly throughout, highlighting key moments in the... Read more
Published 7 months ago by Ms. S. R. Murphy

5.0 out of 5 stars A passion shared
...is not a passion halved in this case. I, like MacFarlane, am a bloke slightly obsessed with mountains and he took me back to some good memories of climbs that I will probably... Read more
Published on 18 Jun 2007 by Richard K

5.0 out of 5 stars Fantastic prose!
I have tended to read books of the mountains when skiing each year and this book was fantastic in its ability to explain why we take risks and why people climb mountains. Read more
Published on 13 Mar 2007 by speakmymind

5.0 out of 5 stars If you love mountains you must read this.
I don't feel qualified to review this following the universally excellent comments it has justly received. Read more
Published on 28 Aug 2005 by John Gilson

4.0 out of 5 stars A gentle climb
This book has been deservedly praised for the way it traverses a great deal of material with such elegance and elan. Read more
Published on 12 Jun 2005

2.0 out of 5 stars Travels through 'Deep Time.'
O the mind, mind has mountains..............

Gerard Manly Hopkins. c.1880

In this unique book Robert MacFarlane presents us with mountains both as physical/ geological... Read more

Published on 26 Jan 2005 by charlie orr

5.0 out of 5 stars A real tour de force
This IS one of the most absorbing books I have read for a long time. What is it with our fascination with mountains? Read more
Published on 10 Jul 2004 by andyhowell3

5.0 out of 5 stars It's not all about ropes and rucksacks -- that's the point
Every time there is a spectacular death in the hills, the old question starts up a babbling again: WHY DO THEY (mountain climbers) DO IT? Read more
Published on 5 Jun 2004 by jolsonmcfee2

5.0 out of 5 stars magic mountain
This is both an intelligent and a very beautiful book, and you rarely find both qualities united. Macfarlane takes a risk by writing a book with several voices; the scholar, the... Read more
Published on 12 Feb 2004 by Phil B

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