“Because it’s there.” — George Leigh Mallory, 1923
First of all, by “climb Everest” if you mean get to the top, no one knows if he did. Maybe he did, maybe he didn’t. (My guess is he didn’t.) But that’s beside the point.
If you think people climb mountains just because they’re there, you don’t understand what motivates climbers.
Before we go further, we should put Mallory’s famous remark into context. It was a sound bite that Mallory, while on a U.S. lecture tour, routinely fed to news reporters in response to what he undoubtedly felt was a dumb question.
There are lots of reasons why people climb mountains. Probably as many different reasons as there are climbers. So you can’t really answer the question categorically. But a few reasons that may be common to all climbers include: Mountains are beautiful places, climbing is challenging, and the view from the top is fabulous (given fair weather).
In Mallory’s case, you probably can include national pride (in the ’20s, the Brits were very much into exploration, and still very big on planting their flag everywhere on the planet), adventure, peer competition, and let’s not deny there was fame and glory waiting for the first person to do it. Today climbing Everest is old hat, with hundreds of people doing it every year, mostly amateur nobodies paying professional guides to haul them up there, stepping around camp garbage and dead bodies on the way up. But in 1923 the mountain was still unclimbed, it was a novel adventure, and the fawning media turned Everest climbers into celebrities. Plus, in Mallory’s case there probably also was an element of grim determination, as he had already gotten alluringly close on a previous expedition, and climbers like everyone else want to achieve their objectives.
But these motives aside, arguably the best reason for climbing mountains is because it has no meaning apart except for the climber himself. Therefore, the activity is relatively immune from greed, ambition, and all the other venal human behaviors that make a mess of “civilization.” There’s nothing up there but you, your companions, and nature.
(Oh sure, a few people try to milk climbing for fame, money, or TV time; but if that’s all there in it for, they won’t stick around very long, because there are easier ways of getting those things with less risk to life and limb. See, e.g., Sarah Palin, who obtained fame, money, and TV time simply by pretending to be hilariously stupid.)
So where am I going with this article? Well, I have two points to make.
First, the power of culture in our lives. (This is a subject I love to talk about, even though I’m not an anthropologist) Mallory’s sound bite is a perfect example of an offhand remark acquiring a life of its own; fully 90 years later, it’s still the standard explanation that many ignorant people rely on to rationalize why people more intelligent than they go climb mountains.
Second, Mallory’s sound bite is a perfect example of the fact any remark can become famous, whether or not you intend it to. Do you really want to be a YouTube star? I’m just sayin’. The fine point is it made Mallory sound like an idiot; he wasn’t. That was an unintended consequence.
Third, I’d like to remind my readers there are things to do with your time on earth besides the relentless pursuit of money and status and one of them could be a mount everest base camp trek. This is easy to forget if you live in America. Granted, some of the alternatives to being a greedy narcissistic self-centered preening peacock can endanger life and limb. But then, so do world wars and nuclear explosions and many other perks of “civilization.” Nature only freezes you or drops rocks on you. (If you fall off, don’t blame the mountain; it didn’t push you. It’s just there. It would be within its rights to sue you for splattering your blood and gore all over its pretty rocks.)
I used to climb mountains when I was much younger. It felt good to get away from “civilization,” especially as I had just returned from a war. I didn’t climb mountains because they were there. I climbed them because they were somewhere else, meaning not in the city. For me, sleeping in a heather meadow or on a rocky ledge was simply an alternative lifestyle. Unlike the people in the city, the mountains minded their own business, and I liked being around them for that reason.
I’m not sure how much Mallory just felt an urge to get out of town. But I understand this impulse, and that surely must have been a part of it. Some people aren’t made to spend their lives in cities dealing with other people’s petty social games. It’s really about what goes on inside those people. They just need a “there” to go to, so they don’t have to be “here.” If it isn’t a mountain, it’ll
be something else, simply because of who they are.