Summit Everest An Architectural Essay

Andrew Hum3rd Year HTS Seminar Tutor:

Emmanuil Stavrakakis

Preface

“The Further you appear to be from architecture the closer you actually are.”1

It is difficult to imagine a more irrelevant topic to architecture than the topic of

summiting the peak of Mount Everest. The strenuous climb up steep cliffs and the

exposure to harsh winds and the extreme cold, push the limits of the human body.

The same forces may be a driving force to push the extremes of architecture. The

parallels between the two topics may seem very distant and unrelated; it is for that

reason the juxtaposition of the two are ideal for the purpose of testing the

inclination that architecture can be found in anything.

The relationship between words and things is inexact; language is always quite

vague and never quite precise. It is the imprecision of the relationship between

words and meaning that the idea of universality of basic concepts such as use and

beauty can be found to pervade a culture specialization. Examining the

relationship between man, nature, culture and space with an Everest climb as a

backdrop, architectural concepts are inserted into a narrative provoke a discourse

on the topic architecture and mountaineering.

Taking Word and Buildings as an Architectural Guide to climbing Everest. A

metaphorical climb up Everest will be a journey through critical architectural

vocabulary as they can be found to relate to mountaineering. The aim is to discover

the notion that architecture can be found in all things. This does not suggest that

form in Architecture has the same meaning in mountaineer. This is of course not

true. However, this does not suggest that Form, as it is understood to be in

architecture, does not exist in mountaineering, albeit substituted with another

term. It may possibly be that architects and mountaineers are speaking about the

same things but only encrypted with their own language.

                                                                                                               1  Emmanuil  Stavrakakis,  personal  conversation,  November  1,  2012  

George Mallory on the Moine Ridge of the Aiguille Verte

Mallory finds Everest

‘It was a perfect early morning as we plodded up the barren slopes above our camp,

rising behind the old rugged fort which is itself a singularly impressive and dramatic

spectacle; we had mounted perhaps a thousand feet when we stayed and turned, and

saw what we came to see…who could doubt its identity? It was a prodigious white fang

excrescent from the jaw of the world… We were satisfied that the highest of mountains

would not disappoint us.’2

This is the account of George Mallory’s first sighting of Mount Everest in 1921.

George Mallory was the first person to attempt to climb Mount Everest from 1921 –

1924. Mallory had an obsession, however, that obsession would eventually lead to

his death. For Mallory this obsession began in 1921 on the British Reconnaissance

Expedition to Everest. On first sight, he describes the shapes of the mountain seen

through a fantastic mist like that of the wildest creations of a dream. ‘The

mountain seen in partial glimpses, the mind pieced together a whole from the

fragments to interpret the dream. Notwithstanding what there is to be understood

of the mountain, the summit of Everest was clear.’3 Mallory would return to Everest

the following year and this time with clear intentions of summiting, but was forced

to retreated when an avalanche swept over the group on the North Col, killing

seven Sherpa. His final attempt will be two year later with climbing partner Sandy

Irvine. They were last seen on the North Col on their way to the Summit of Everest

before they were blanketed by a mist of clouds.4

                                                                                                               2  George  Leigh  Mallory,  Climbing  Everest:  The  Complete  Writings  of  George  Leigh  Mallory  (UK:  Gibson  Square,  2012),  106  3  Ibid.,  108  4  Anthony  Geffen,  Director,  The  Wildest  Dream,  2010.    

Everest Map 1988

Everest

Mount Everest is known as the highest point on the surface of the Earth. At

8,848 m above sea level, the top of Everest contains one third the concentration of

oxygen found at sea level, an average annual temperature well below freezing at -

17°C and westerly prevailing winds at an average speed of 12.8m/s. In Tibetan and

Sherpa language the mountain is called Chomolungma, meaning Mother of the

Universe or Goddess Mother of the Earth.5 There is an aura of mysticism

surrounding Everest. It has been told through oral tradition the reason for the

migration of the Sherpa people from the Tibetian Highlands to what is today’s

Nepal, was in search of this Mythical Kingdom of Shangri-la or what is known as

Shambhala in Tibetan Buddhism. Shambhala is a hidden mythical kingdom that

has become to be known as a Buddhist Pure Land. More than a physical place its

reality is visionary and spiritual.6

Everest is a rugged giant, it is a great rock mass coated with a thin layer of white

powder. There are, however, gentler slopes in the Northwest arête. Mallory

describes its structures as slight articulated buttresses, like the nave of a vast

cathedral roofed with snow. It reminded him of the long high nave and low square

tower of Winchester Cathedral in Hampshire. He remarked about how only at a

considerable distance could one appreciate the great height and the strength of

this building. To appreciate the height of Everest similarly, one requires a distant

view to realise its height and beauty.7

                                                                                                               5  Harry  Kikstra,  Everest:  Summit  of  the  World  (Dunblane:  Rucksack  Readers,  2009),  44.  6  Heinz  Legar,  Climbing  Everest  with  a  Mountain  on  My  Back:  The  Sherpa’s  Story  (BBC  4),  Feb  19  2013  7  George  Leigh  Mallory,  Climbing  Everest:  The  Complete  Writings  of  George  Leigh  Mallory  (UK:  Gibson  Square,  2012),  116.  

Panorama of Everest from The Early Expedition

Why Climb Everest

In 1923, with the Explorers Club of New York as the audience, New York Times

Journalist asked Mallory, “Why climb Everest?” Mallory replied, “Because it’s

there.” He went on to explain: “Everest is the highest mountain in the world, and

no man has reached its summit. Its existence is a challenge. The answer is

instinctive, a part, I suppose, of man’s desire to conquer the universe.”8 It seems

difficult to find a suitable justification for everyone to agree on. Mallory was aware

of this and expanded on his response:

“People ask me, 'What is the use of climbing Mount Everest?' and my

answer must at once be, 'It is of no use. 'There is not the slightest prospect of

any gain whatsoever. Oh, we may learn a little about the behavior of the

human body at high altitudes, and possibly medical men may turn our

observation to some account for the purposes of aviation. But otherwise

nothing will come of it. We shall not bring back a single bit of gold or silver,

not a gem, nor any coal or iron... If you cannot understand that there is

something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes

out to meet it, that the struggle is the struggle of life itself upward and

forever upward, then you won't see why we go. What we get from this

adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not

live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to live. That

is what life means and what life is for.”9

The issue of ‘use’ is a problem of the concept of function in everyday life. The

fundamental problem, by definition, is the absence of the idea of pleasure and joy

in its discourse. Because, in the end, all that can be got from Everest is joy and

nothing more. Possibly, pleasure and joy is something that cannot be put into

                                                                                                               8  Robert  Deis,  Subtropic  Productions:  The  Origins  of  George  Mallory’s  Famous  Mountain  Climbing  Quote:  “Because  it’s  there.”  http://www.thisdayinquotes.com/2010/03/george-­‐mallory-­‐coins-­‐because-­‐its-­‐there.html  (March  2013)  9  Otis  Chandler,  Goodreads:  Climbing  Everest  Quotes,  http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/10228518-­‐climbing-­‐everest-­‐the-­‐complete-­‐writings-­‐of-­‐george-­‐mallory  (March  2013)  

The north-east arête of Mount Everest

words nor is a concept open to analysis. Pleasure is after all an introspective

concepts, however, this does not mean the justification based on pleasure is not a

legitimate one.

Heideggar expresses what Mallory states as the ‘challenge’ with the term

‘character’. ‘Character’ is the notion of the desire to ‘satisfy man’s need to identify

himself with the environment to know how he is in a certain place’.10 Perhaps this

desire is linked to what Adrian Forty posits as the distinction between the ‘world

created by man – ‘culture’ – and the world in which man exists – ‘nature’.11 To

identify himself with the environment, man must remove himself from the world

create by man, in order to realize himself in a certain place. In a culture of specifics

and specialization a common denominator can be derived from the most basic of

questions of why? It is when things are reduced to its most basic that we can find

connections and relations between all things. This is what can be found on

Everest.

                                                                                                               10  Adrian  Forty,  Words  and  Buildings:  A  Vocabulary  of  Modern  Architecture  (London:  Thames  &  Hudson,  2000),  120.  11  Ibid.,  220.  

The 1924 Everest Expedition.Sandy Irvine Back row left, George Mallory Back row 2nd left

Life and Death

The journey to the summit of Everest is a struggle of life and death created by the

confrontation between the mountain and the climber. The order of Man and the

order of the mountain are independent of each other and through the act of

climbing there is a confrontation that arises between the two. The relationship

between climber and mountain is one of violence, as the human body intrudes

onto the mountain.12 The mountain aims is to dissolve the climber and make it a

part of itself. The climbers aim is to live and in order to do so, he must reach the

summit.

Climbing Everest begins with a 300 km drive from Kathmandu to Everest

basecamp. Along the route there will be elevation gains of 3000 m. The drive

becomes the start of the acclimation process to high altitude living. By spending

nights in the high altitude villages of Zhangmu, Nyalam and New Tingri, there will

be opportunities to do short acclimation hikes and to visit the monasteries of

Shegar Chode and Rongbuk. Where climbers can prey to seek divine blessing for

the expedition.13

Through the high altitude passes and switchbacks, the landscape changes from

lush forests to barren landscapes. On a clear day on the Pang-La Pass from New

Tingris to Everest Base Camp, some of the world’s tallest mountain can be seen in

the horizon, including Everest. Base Camp is only a few kilometers from this point

and is recognizable as an open field filled with tents and yaks in an old moraine

just below the snout of the Rongbuk Glacier.

Everest Base Camp is the first of a series of camps along the route. Each separated

by elevation gains of 600 m and climbing distances of 5-8 hours. The camps are

designed for altitude acclimatization as well as places for sleep and rest. Full

                                                                                                               12  Bernard  Tschumi,  Architecture  and  Disjunction  (Cambridge,  Massachusetts:  MIT  Press,  1996),  122  13  Harry  Kikstra,  Everest:  Summit  of  the  World  (Dunblane:  Rucksack  Readers,  2009),  52.  

Kathmandu, Nepal

Panoramic view of Himalaya’s from Pang La Pass

Everest Base Camp

acclimatization to high altitude living may take several weeks, but the body

responds immediately by increasing the rate and depth of breathing and in

minutes the heart begins to beat faster. In several days the body starts creating

more red blood cells and expelling excess fluids. These changes respond to the

increase difficulty of the lungs ability to extract oxygen from the atmosphere to

supply the body’s muscles and organs.14

The route to the summit contains various challenges and difficulties. From

unexpected crevasses and avalanches to health issues such as frost bite, snow

blindness, sun burn and to more fetal issues like summit fever and Acute Mountain

Sickness (AMS). Theses are symptoms of the extreme cold and low oxygen levels

related to high altitude conditions. It is a challenge to deal with the surroundings.

With advances in mountaineering equipment it has made life more manageable,

but still it does not mean these issues can be totally avoided.15

Ascending from the North Col to Camp 2 will take you to the upper part of Everest

to what is known as the Death Zone. The Death Zone is usually above 7500m, the

conditions are beyond the ability of the body to acclimatize and the body slowly

decays. It is not suggested to stay at this altitude for more than 3 days. The Death

Zone on Everest is appropriately named, as it is a high altitude cemetery of bodies

preserved by the cold. Most deaths on Everest are not caused by accidents but by

the effects of the conditions in the Death Zone. It is from this point onwards

climbers start using the supplemental oxygen and become fully clothed in their

down jackets, gloves, crampons and other essential gear.

From Camp 2 it is a relatively easy climb to the High Camp and from the High

Camp to the summit the climb is only 12 hours. This climb, however, will be the

longest and toughest climb on Everest. Climbers depart from camp at midnight to

start the journey on a steep snowfield. It is important for climbers to monitor their

                                                                                                               14  Ibid.,  17.  15  Ibid.,  27-­‐30.    

oxygen and consider turning around if needed. On the path climbers will

encounter three ridges, which are named First, Second and Third Steps. The

Second Step is the most challenging of the three. It is suspected that it was at this

ridge Mallory and Irvine met their fate. Today there is a ladder over the lower parts

of this ridge, but it is still a challenging climb. The Third Step is much easier and

is relatively flat. The summit of Everest is 3 hours from the Third Step.16

                                                                                                               16  Ibid.,  68-­‐70.  

The Second Step

Nature and Beauty

The arduous climb of Everest is a labor of atonement, with the only reassurance of

the fact that the going gets easier as it gets higher. Until, at the very summit of

Everest, the climber can have the sense of what Dante experienced on his climb up

the mountain of Purgatory, where upon reaching the Earthly Paradise he remarks

of the feeling of a “force within his wings growing for the flight”, the terrestrial

paradise is discovered. The summit of Everest is not a true paradise, but possibly a

place of self-purification and devout introspection in front of an unobstructed view

of the world, where the inner self can be even more clearly seen.17 This sensation is

what beauty is.

Beauty is no quality in things themselves; it exists merely in the mind which

contemplates them; and each mind perceives a different beauty. The beauty of

Everest is more a beauty found from the quality of the experience of nature rather

than from the nature as object, this is known as the Sublime. In the Sublime,

beauty has less to do with the scale and proportions of natural objects, but more to

do with the aesthetic sensation induced by the sight of natural objects.18 The

expression of beauty is the sensation stimulated from the sight of the Himalayas

from the top of Everest. The sensation induces feelings of delight to raise the

human spirit. It is at this point where man can more clearly identify himself with

the environment and acknowledge his certain place.

                                                                                                               17Simon  Schama,  Landscape  &  Memory  (London:  Harper  Press,  2004),  421  18  Adrian  Forty,  Words  and  Buildings:  A  Vocabulary  of  Modern  Architecture  (London:  Thames  &  Hudson,  2000),  229.  

View from the Summit of Everest

Conclusion

It is not the intensity of feelings that determines a place in the subconscious self,

but it is something else rather. When there are parts in climbing that give us the

feeling of things unfulfilled that fill us with doubt and angst, we move forward

apprehensive of the goal. Discomforts are not accepted as necessary struggles and

the spirit and body seems to betray each other. But, a time comes when all this is

changed and we experience a harmony and a satisfaction. The individual is

submerged, not in the sense that the consciousness is suppressed but is heighted

beyond the singular to become aware of the realization of the self. For Mallory it is

these moments of supreme harmonious experiences that remain always with us

and a part of us. 19

Each expedition contains a beginning and an end and these are fixed. Not all

adventures are the same and this can be said of all things. But, every adventure is

complete; this is because there is a beginning, an end and an in between. On a

journey to Everest, one cannot extract or subtract parts of the adventure and still

have a whole. Each part depends upon all parts and their relation to each other.

The glory of the summit of Everest is not independent of the preceding events of

the journey up or the prospects of the descent down.20

                                                                                                               19  Ibid.,  24.  20  George  Leigh  Mallory,  Climbing  Everest:  The  Complete  Writings  of  George  Leigh  Mallory  (UK:  Gibson  Square,  2012),  22.  

Mount Everest

Epilogue

Through the essay on an Everest climb, many concepts and issues as they relate to

architecture were discussed. A direct comparison was avoided to create an attempt

of using the technique of an allegory to explore the relationships between things.

The use of the mountain can be taken to represent space and looks at the climber

as an intruder on the mountain, just as Tschumi takes the body as an intrusion into

an architectural space. The result is a confrontation in an act of violence of

intensity between individuals and their surrounding spaces. Tschumi’s idea on ‘the

pleasure of architecture’ was used to make sense and to find relationships with

Mallory’s justification of climbing Everest. Mallory stated the justification of

climbing Everest was the fact that it was there and because of its presence it was a

challenge and from the challenge we can get joy.

The summit of Everest was an opportunity to create a dialogue involving the

difficult subject of beauty and of the sublime. Taking the sensation of the act of

summiting Everest to explain beauty as an experience of nature rather tan the

imitation of nature’s order and proportions. Parallels were made between the ideas

of Sublime by Burke and in literature with a description of Dante’s climb up the

mountain of Purgatory. Through this connection, broader philosophical and

spiritual ideas of the inner self and identity were made. The contributions of

Mallory should not be disregarded, as his writings on mountaineering and on

Everest were the starting point for the dialogue between Everest and architecture.

The technique of using allegory allows for very difficult concepts to be

communicated and understood. In accordance to the ideas of the sublime, this

essay was written to be understood as an experience.

Bibliography

 Chandler,  Otis,  Goodreads:  Climbing  Everest  Quotes,  http://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/10228518-­‐climbing-­‐everest-­‐the-­‐complete-­‐writings-­‐of-­‐george-­‐mallory  (March  2013)   Deis,  Robert,  Subtropic  Productions:  The  Origins  of  George  Mallory’s  Famous  Mountain  Climbing  Quote:  “Because  it’s  there.”  http://www.thisdayinquotes.com/2010/03/george-­‐mallory-­‐coins-­‐because-­‐its-­‐there.html  (March  2013)  Forty,  Adrian.  Words  and  Buildings:  A  Vocabulary  of  Modern  Architecture.  London:  Thames  &  Hudson,  2000.    Geffen,  Anthony  Director,  The  Wildest  Dream,  2010.      Kikstra,  Harry,  Everest:  Summit  of  the  World.  Dunblane:  Rucksack  Readers,  2009.    Legar,  Heinz  Climbing  Everest  with  a  Mountain  on  My  Back:  The  Sherpa’s  Story  (BBC  4),  Feb  19  2013    Mallory,  George  Leigh,  Climbing  Everest:  The  Complete  Writings  of  George  Leigh  Mallory.  UK:  Gibson  Square,  2012.    Schama,  Simon,  Landscape  &  Memory.  London:  Harper  Press,  2004.    Tschumi,  Bernard,  Architecture  and  Disjunction.  Cambridge,  Massachusetts:  MIT  Press,  1996.      

Image Sources

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