The Impossible Climb

Overall I enjoyed this book, particularly for the genre, but I'll confess that, over the years, I've become far more sensitive to the limiting tropes of that genre, i.e. 'amazing heroic adventure dude (and it's always a dude) doing amazing heroic adventures' and sometimes being sad (to the point of maudlin excess) about fellow climbers killed in the mountains, but ultimately concluding with variations on cliches about 'doing what we love' or 'finding inspiration and sharing wonder' or 'it really isn't that risky, when you think about the dangers of freeway driving ...'

... to be clear, I don't mean these as criticisms: I've said some of these things myself, more than a few times. I'm simply pointing out that they are indeed cliches of the mountaineering genre, although of course that genre has become more complex, not least since the popular success of Krakauer's "Into Thin Air."

Synnott writes well - indeed, at times beautifully - and he tries to overcome the limits of the genre. He doesn't always succeed, but when he does, I'd say he's at least as successful as Andrew Toddhunter, who crafted a structurally similar book around the life of Dan Osman ("The Fall of the Phantom Lord"). Like Toddhunter, Synnott is sharing the life of a remarkable figure by telling his own story. This is, of course, a venerable narrative strategy, but it's relatively novel in the 'climbing and mountaineering' genre. I think it works well, in both of these books.

The fairness and coherence of Synnott's reporting on Alex Honnold does falter at points. Indeed, there's a very brief point where the story gets weird, and one reviewer has fixated on that strange passage, reading the rest of the book in light of the gendered elements of this fleeting moment in the narrative. I don't think that critical reading is entirely fair, but it's also not wrong. Synnott doesn't always succeed in reflecting on how much of his own life has involved buying into a particular vision of masculinity, backed by socioeconomic privilege: dirtbag rockclimbers and beachbum surfers rarely start life in poverty; they are overwhelmingly white and of European settler ancestry; and of course this hardly surprising, given that mountaineering began as a sport for aristocratic English and European gentlemen of leisure.

That said, I do think Synnott is trying hard - and often successfully - to acknowledge some of these very real problems. The dominance of Lynn Hill in Yosemite climbing (and beyond) is acknowledged, although much more could be said about her story, her legacy. Also, as far as I know, this is is the first book in the climbing genre to tell the deeply disturbing story of how indigenous peoples were driven out of Yosemite valley, their stories and voices erased by state-sanctioned brutality and settler indifference.

Mark is also clearly trying to weigh his candid and balanced recollections against his obvious affection and deep respect for Alex Honnold. His recollections of Alex Lowe are likely to be more controversial among climbing elders, although whether you conclude "salacious rubbish inspired by jealousy!" or "about time someone told the truth!" will probably depend on where you sit in a complicated web of friendships and cliques that came out of the transformation of North American climbing, from a dirtbag anti-establishment lifestyle to a complex global multimedia adventure industry.

Yes, I recommend this book: it's an honest and uncompromising account not only of the climbing life, but of how that life has changed over the decades. Could that account be more introspective and inclusive? Yes, definitely, but Mark labours mightily to tell his story in a way that gives most of the players a voice, even when some of those voices would likely disagree with his interpetations. In the end that's all you can really ask of an author: to tell their story and give others a voice.

Oh, and it's also a detailed account of one of the greatest feats in climbing history, by a complex and compelling character, Alex Honnold, so there's that too!