Storms Of Silence - Softcover

SIMPSON, Joe

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0099578115 ISBN 13: 9780099578116

Publisher: Vintage, 1997

Synopsis

In Storms of Silence Joe Simpson recalls the severe snowstorm which put an end to an attempt with four others on Gangchempo and the infection which forced him to abandon the climb on Cho Oyu in tibet. During that expedition he has a disturbing encounter with a party of political refugees and a 4-year-old boy fleeing across the Tibetan border. He becomes obsessed with stories of Chinese brutality in the old world Tibet they overran by force 40 years ago. He also begins to question the ethic of playing rich men's games in Third World countries, contributing little to the local people who endure a fearful struggle to survive. Oppression abroad makes him see mindless violence in his home town of Sheffield in a new light. The books ends with his first trip to the Andes in Peru since Touching the Void.

About this title

Review:

In Storms Of Silence, Joe Simpson presents a thoughtful, funny, moving account of his maverick life as a mountaineer. But behind the rich tapestry of adventures lies a dark and brooding disquiet. Simpson recalls the terrifying avalanche that nearly wiped out his base camp during an attempt on the unclimbed north face of Gangchmpo in the Himalaya. While climbing on Cho Oyo he meets a band of Khampas, including a four-year-old boy, fleeing over the high Nangpa La pass from the brutality of Chinese oppression in Tibet. Simpson's love of Himalayan life contrasts with the ruthless Chinese destruction of the Tibetan culture and people. A violent brush with a skinhead in his home town of Sheffield is mirrored in his chilling encounter with the Peruvian police. On Huascaran (Peru's highest mountain) he hears unnerving ghostly voices and learns of the earthquake which buried 18,000 people and wiped out the town of Yungay below him. It reminds him of his boyhood visit to the Nazi concentration camp at Belsen. Storms Of Silence ends with the trauma of reliving, in quite unexpected circumstances, the dance with death he had encountered before and recorded in his previous book Touching the Void. Storms Of Silence will be eagerly greeted by anyone who has read Simpson's earlier works such as This Game of Ghosts. He writes with a vivid engagement rarely equaled, and never surpassed in tales of true adventure mountaineering and exploration. -- Midwest Book Review

About this edition

• Publisher: Vintage
• Publication date: 1997
• ISBN 10: 0099578115
• ISBN 13: 9780099578116
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 336