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Into the Silence
- Narrated by: Enn Reitel
- Length: 28 hrs and 53 mins
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Into the Silence
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Publisher's Summary
Winner of the 2012 Samuel Johnson prize
A monumental work of history, biography and adventure – the First World War, Mallory and Mount Everest – ten years in the writing. If the quest for Mount Everest began as a grand imperial gesture, as redemption for an empire of explorers that had lost the race to the Poles, it ended as a mission of regeneration for a country and a people bled white by war.Of the twenty-six British climbers who, on three expeditions (1921-24), walked 400 miles off the map to find and assault the highest mountain on Earth, twenty had seen the worst of the fighting: six had been severely wounded; two others nearly killed by disease at the Front; one hospitalized twice with shell shock; three army surgeons, who dealt for the duration with the agonies of the dying; two lost brothers, killed in action. All had endured the slaughter, the coughing of the guns, the bones and barbed wire, the white faces of the dead.
In a monumental work of history and adventure, ten years in the writing, Wade Davis asks not whether George Mallory was the first to reach the summit of Everest, but rather why he kept on climbing on that fateful day. His answer lies in a single phrase uttered by one of the survivors as they retreated from the mountain: 'The price of life is death.' Mallory walked on because for him, as for all of his generation, death was but 'a frail barrier that men crossed, smiling and gallant, every day'. As climbers they accepted a degree of risk unimaginable before the war. They were not cavalier, but death was no stranger. They had seen so much that it had no hold on them. What mattered was how one lived, the moments of being alive. For all of them Everest had become an exalted radiance, a sentinel in the sky, a symbol of hope in a world gone mad.
An Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society, Wade Davis holds degrees in anthropology and biology and a PhD in ethnobotany, all from Harvard University. Davis is the author of 15 books including The Serpent and the Rainbow, One River, and The Wayfinders. His many film credits include Light at the Edge of the World, an eight-hour documentary series produced for the National Geographic Channel. In 2009 he received the Gold Medal from the Royal Canadian Geographical Society for his contributions to anthropology and conservation, and he is the 2011 recipient of the Explorers Medal, the highest award of the Explorers' Club, and the 2012 David Fairchild Medal for Plant Exploration, the most prestigious prize for botanical exploration.
Critic Reviews
What listeners say about Into the Silence
Average Customer RatingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Luke
- 02-10-2022
A multifaceted look at the world's highest peak
This was truly an incredible look at, not just Mallory's attempts at summiting Everest, but also the background of the times, the sensibility of the age, the hopelessness of war and the human drive towards ever increasingly daring acts of valour.
The 29 hours absolutely flies by, and the multiple threads gathered into this masterpiece all connect to weave a beautiful picture of not only what happened but how people felt about what happened.
This truly is an incredible book and I encourage anyone to listen to the audio. Despite its rather daunting length it is very digestible and is easily listened to in 15-20 minute chunks.
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Overall4 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story4 out of 5 stars
- Amazon Customer
- 28-11-2017
Inspiring endurance and bravery
hard book to get into at the beginning but worth sticking out. Found the war time recollections a bit too strung out and for me would have been great to summarise by atleast 50%. Wade really does spend the time building the life story of each key character but to me the diary recollections on the climbing was captivating.
Quite terrible the number of dead bodies on that mountain and the lengths people will go to climb it. In someways i feel people who continue to climb that particular mountain are rather selfess with disregard to the dead and environment. Just whatever it takes to archive your persona goal eh. Respect to those that risk their lives in cleaning up the mountain.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- The Quiet Reader
- 03-05-2018
Encompassing history of early Everest Expeditions
A well told coverage of the early British Expeditions to Mount Everest. The narrative was both informative and rich with the characters associated with those vain attempts to climb Everest. I appreciated the meticulous research and the non judgmental style of the author. Too, I enjoyed the timbre of the narrator. In summary one of the most enjoyable books I have listened to. Highly recommended.
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1 person found this helpful
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Michael Rafferty
- 13-09-2017
A magnificent audio book
Easily, the most captivating book I have experienced in years. This is a big book and the size seems to match the dimensions of the story. The backdrop to the Everest Expeditions is painted with vivid colours. The experience of the First World War shaped many if not all the characters in this amazing story and lent gravitas to the actions of the British explorers. These were imperfect heroes, presented as humans with human vulnerabilities and flaws. It is to the credit of the author that these "warts and all" biographies makes Mallory and colleagues seem more heroic, not less.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Wendy
- 04-12-2017
Outstanding
So good, can we have more books by the same author and reader please Audible?
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance4 out of 5 stars
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Story2 out of 5 stars
- Simon Hayter
- 03-04-2021
Climbing Everest would be slightly quicker...
Well researched, but would have benefitted from leaving out some of the gazillion factoids found during the research phase. The writer puts the reader in the story really well, but then buries them in an avalanche of unnecessary information. It turns a great story into a long hard slog.
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