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Climbers In Into Thin Air

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For as long as anyone can remember, people have dreamed of reaching the summit of Mt. Everest. During May of 1996, an expedition set out to Nepal to attempt a climb up Mt. Everest. By the end of this expedition to the top of Everest, many climbers lost their lives due to the brutal weather. In Jon Krakauer’s novel Into Thin Air, he takes readers through the story of the expedition, and he talks about the climbers who died. Among the list of the dead was a man named Doug Hansen. Doug worked two different jobs to afford to go on the trip to Everest, and was making his second attempt to reach the summit of Everest. Doug came back to Everest to try and reach the summit for the first time. Because Doug failed to reach the summit on his first attempt, I argue that Doug Hansen’s primary motivation …show more content…

In Gavin Carter’s article Between Nothing and Everything, he said “Why people climb mountains is the subject of frequent speculation, and once one steers clear of the red herring ‘because it’s there’, one tends to land on the notion that it has something to do with constructing, embodying and communicating meaning- for oneself or for others” (15). Since this quote talks about how someone either climbs Everest for themselves or someone else for a personally reason, it fits Doug because he climbs Everest for himself. Since Doug climbs Everest because he did not reach the peak the previous year, he proves that he only wants to climb Everest for himself. Ever since the day he could not reach the summit of Everest, Doug only thinks about climbing to the summit of Everest, and fights through extreme injuries (like the frozen larynx and frostbite) to reach the summit. In a way, Everest is a part of Doug because the thought of Everest never left him, and he died after reaching the one goal he

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