The Siege of Nanga Parbat

Publication Year: 1957.

The Siege of Nanga Parbat, by Paul Bauer. London: Rupert

Hart-Davis, 1956. 211 pages; 23 photographs; 2 maps. Price 25 s. Paul Bauer, famous for his climbs on Kangchenjunga, was also closely connected with Nanga Parbat. He considered it as a climbing possibility in 1929, headed the rescue party sent to it after the '37 disaster, and was leader of the 1938 expedition. His small book gives a complete, though necessarily condensed, survey of the attempts on the mountain, including everything from the mid-nineteenth-century explorations of Adolf Schlagintweit, the first European to see the peak, to Buhl’s solo climb to the summit in 1953. The style is clear, simple, and pleasant, with interesting and valuable comments on the mountain and its problems. The two maps are unusually well drawn and detailed, and the photographs, apparently selected from those of all the expeditions, include some that are outstandingly beautiful. Regrettably, occasional little mistakes have been made in the translation, and there is no index.

Elizabeth Knowlton