Sacred Summits: John Muir's Greatest Climbs (Travel)

Rating:
Summary: John Muir's Sacred Summits
Review: Graham white has collected a fine Scottish edition of Muir's mountaineering essays along with appreciative essays on muir as a mountaineer by Arthur W. Ewart, Francis P. Farquhar, Ken Crocket, Samuel hall Young, and Aubrey haines. This edition serves the needs of readers in the British Isles since my own edition of Muir's Mountaineering essays was not readily available on the other side of the Atlantic. In his introduction, White explains that "it is equally clear that in the boldness of all Muir's solitary ascents, it was not the mountain which was conquered, but the limitations of self which were transcended. White expresses grave concern about the trashing of mountains by countless hordes of people in the late twentieth century whose sole purpose is to "bag another peak." He admonishes us with a forceful statement: "If we are to sustain the world's fragile mountain environments through another century of recreation and tourism development, the challenge is for the climbing, and hill-walking community to emulate John Muir's example by adopting a far deeper ethos." Though some of the essays White collects are a bit duplicative, overall Graham White's new collection makes for a very good read.