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The Frozen River
- Seeking Silence in the Himalaya
- Narrated by: James Crowden
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
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The Frozen River
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Publisher's Summary
‘A tour de force of luminous writing.’ Mark Cocker, Spectator
‘In 1976 James Crowden left his career in the British army and travelled to Ladakh in the Northern Himalaya, one of the most remote parts of the world. The Frozen River is his extraordinary account of the time he spent there, living alongside the Zangskari people, before the arrival of roads and mass tourism.
James immerses himself in the Zangskari way of life, where meditation and week-long mountain festivals go hand in hand, and silence and solitude are the hallmarks of existence. When butter traders invite James on their journey down the frozen river Leh, he soon realises that this way of living, unchanged for centuries, comes with a very human cost.
In lyrical prose, James captures a crucial moment in time for this Himalayan community. A moment in which their Buddhist practices and traditions are in flux, and the economic pull of a world beyond their valley is increasingly difficult to ignore.
Critic Reviews
"In prose hard as the frost and gritty as the rocks, James Crowden weathers a Himalayan winter in snow-bound Zanskar and recalls the boundless hospitality and ingenuity of his wind-furrowed hosts. Crowden and Zanskar are a match made on high." (John Keay, author of India: A History)
"Terrific. Crowden is a meditative swashbuckler: imagine John Buchan, cross-legged in a mountain monastery, smelling of sandalwood incense, or Wordsworth on speed, with a belt jangling with karabiners." (Charles Foster, author of Being a Beast)
"A luminous book, exquisite in its depiction, profound in its rhymes of ice and mind. As testament to its transporting power, when I’d finished it I felt I had spent a winter in Zanskar." (Jay Griffiths, author of Wild)