Trotter and Messner--T.S.M. Newsletter
Greetings from Peaklessburg.
I am currently reading Walter Bonatti’s memoirs The Mountains of My Life, which are an English translation of select portions of his two books in Italian. I only read in English, so I can’t do compare and contrast of the work and experience, though I would like to. It would be a big undertaking, and that’s what appeals to me. However, I probably have enough to do with trying to read, for myself, all the books that could be the classics of climbing literature, and also name the ones that are the book equivalent of Fifty Classic Climbs.
Big goals and long projects are kind of my thing, and that’s what I am enjoying about reading Bonatti’s book now. Bonatti made a life. He had talent, of course, but grit, which anyone can adopt, he also had in spades. He had passion and perseverance that surpassed all kinds of challenges, and most of all rumors and backstabbing. It was after that conflict that he climbed the SW Pillar of Petit Dru.
I love a good autobiography, because even though we know or remember someone for their accomplishments, we forget about the pain, struggle, adversity, and grief they experienced. They got through it. And we can go through it too. I am currently in a season where I am watching loved ones suffer through the onset of dementia. We’re finding accumulating debt and today I need to go out of town and get their car out of repossession. It’s sad and this period will pass too. There will be SW Pillar, of some kind, on the other side. I know, because I am already looking for one.
For this month’s newsletter, I point out the last two posts on the blog since my last one, I have a correction, which I am still slapping my head about, let you know about two new books, including one by Reinhold Messner, and I link to a film by Simon Yamamoto’s with Trotter, Caldwell, and Honnold.
RECENT POSTS, in case you missed them...
Current Trends in Mountain Lit
What makes today’s mountain climbing books — the narratives — unique, among those that have come before? Some are a little contrived, but is that for good reason? Read more here.
Reflecting on ‘Kiss or Kill’ by Mark Twight
I can’t seem to recall when I first read Mark Twight’s collected works in Kiss or Kill: Confessions of a Serial Climber. I must have read his articles earlier because they left a deep impression on my young mind and confused me for several years: How could someone so bold and innovative in his climbing, that was so insightful and inspiring, and be such a dark person at same time? Was there something wrong with him, or was there some wrong with my perspective? Click this to read on.
UPCOMING BOOKS
The Mountaineers Books is publishing a new book by Reinhold Messner, Against the Wind: Reflections on a Self Determined Life, which is his life memoir. He’s written several stories about his climbs and searching for his brother. All of them were overrated because they were not easily readable. I often wondered whether it was the translation into English; was something lost? From the publisher:
He also addresses darker times and infamous controversies--including being discredited as a young mountaineer, his divorce and remarriage, Guinness stripping him of his world records in 2023, the recent revisions to measurements of 8000-meter summits, and the discovery of his brother Gunther’s remains on Nanga Parbat.
I’ll be reading it. It comes out on November 1, 2025.
Paul Zizka’s book of photos from the Canadian Rockies, The Canadian Rockies Rediscovered, is now being released in paperback by Rocky Mountain Books. Zizka is a mountain man and the husband of Meghan Ward, the author and blogger. I have followed both for years on social media, and now is a good time to get Zizka’s photos somewhere larger than your smartphone.
CORRECTION
Writing without an editor on this blog, and my preference to write over best practices of re-reading, editing, revising, and asking if what I wrote makes sense, bites me now and then. In my March newsletter, I reported that Cassidy Randall’s book was about the first female ascent of Denali. A reader quickly pointed out that Barbara Washburn, Bradford’s wife, made the FFA, and he was correct and I knew that. I omitted the word “all” in first all-female ascent. (Dammit. I really thought it said that.) My apologies. (Aside, Barbara’s memoir, Accidental Mountaineer is a short and enjoyable read. Interesting that I haven’t written about it yet.)
STILL CLIMBING
Sonnie Trotter’s memoir is coming out in the middle of May and he is still climbing hard. In March, he climbed Prosthetics, a 5.13d (ahem) sport route in Mill Creek in Utah with trad gear. He’s 45. In a way, that explains the trad gear. His age and the trad gear is what I admire.
There is also a new film by Simon Yamamoto about Trotter’s, Caldwell’s and Honnold’s gentleman’s wager on who would be the first among them to climb 5.14d. It’s 9a, in European terms, and not the hardest in the world, which is supposedly 5.15d or 9c. At this level of grades, my head just nods at the numbers. Trying to grasp their practical meaning between grades is like trying to understand the distance of planets from the sun. Well, maybe that’s an exaggeration. I do however get dedication and working to hone a craft, so I don’t entirely glaze over.
So here is the film by Yamamoto:
Have a good rest of your springtime. I’ll be back at the end of May.
Climbing matters and you do too.
Andrew