The Life of Don Whillans

The Villain

Joint Winner of the Boardman Tasker Prize 2005 and Winner of the Banff Mountaineering History Award 2005. 
 
A fascinating and thought-provoking biography of a climbing legend.

A packed and entertaining book . . . Exhaustively researched and beautifully written

Wonderfully crafted . . . One of the most gifted chroniclers of mountaineering . . . Perrin records it all with a subtle sympathy, laying bare British mountaineering's most mythologized figure

An extraordinarily rich and unsentimental vision . . . The genius of this exceptional biography is that it articulates both sides of Whillans' character . . . It is by turns funny and tragic . . . This is a fine book. It was worth the wait

Compelling, beautifully written . . . There could not have been a better writer qualified to tell it

A kind of modern tragedy . . . Yet for all his failings, Whillans remains a legend

Jim Perrin is one of Britain's most highly regarded travel writers and was one of the best British rock-climbers - with many new routes, significant solo ascents and free ascents at the top standards of the day. He is a regular contributor to the Guardian, the Daily Telegraph, Climber, The Great Outdoors and broadcasts regularly on radio. His biography, Menlove, was the first outright winner of the Boardman Tasker Prize, for which all of his subsequent books have been shortlisted. His previous book, Travels with The Flea and Other Eccentric Journeys, was published to critical acclaim in 2002.

Don Whillans has an iconic significance for generations of climbers. His epoch-making first ascent of Annapurna's South Face, achieved with Dougal Haston in 1970, remains one of the most impressive climbs ever made - but behind this and all his other formidable achievements lies a tough, recalcitrant reality: the character of the man himself. 
 
Whillans carried within himself a sense of personal invincibility, forceful, direct and uncompromising. It gave him sporting superstar status - the flawed heroism of a Best, a McEnroe, an Ali. In his own circle, his image was the working-class hero on the rock-face, laconic and bellicose, ready to go to war with the elements or with any human who crossed his path on a bad day.

Jim Perrin

This is witty, literate, erudite and committed writing, and I'll be surprised if this anniversary year sees a better mountaineering book.

destined to become a classic in the genre of mountaineering literature

A fascinating portrait of a friendship that pushed the boundaries of knowledge and endeavour

The author’s great strength is his knowledge of climbing, which gives him an insight into the psychology and practice of mountain exploration

This comprehensive and important book, the result of 30 years of research, deserves to be read to the end. It gets better and funnier, as it progresses and it leaves even those such as me, for whom mountaineering has always been something of a mystery, beginning to understand and respect what drives true climbers

Jim Perrin takes us over peaks and glaciers as he recounts Shipton and Tilman’s exploits during a time when exploring meant travelling to places never before mapped by man. A humbling, gripping read.

Gives several new insights into the lives of these two great men and additionally shows a number of previously unpublished photos, maps and etchings of Tilman and Shipton.

Using unpublished diaries, Jim Perrin, the acclaimed author of The Villain and Menlove, tells the story of the greatest exploring partnership in British history. In the 1930s Tilman and the younger Shipton pioneered many routes in Africa and the Himalayas and found the key to unlocking Everest. They crossed Africa by bicycle, explored China with Spender and Auden, journeyed down the Oxus River to its source and, with no support, opened up much of the Nepalese Himalaya. In the words of Jim Perrin, 'The journeys of discovery undertaken through two decades by this pair of venturesome ragamuffins are unparallelled in the annals of mountain exploration.' 
 
Jim Perrin writes of his source-material: 'These unpublished diaries, journals, and extensive correspondence have not previously been used to present a portrait of the most productive friendship in the history of mountain exploration. What they reveal is, in Shipton's phrase, "a random harvest of delight" gathered by two uniquely bold and engaging characters from the great mountain ranges of the world during the golden era of their first western exploration. Between geographical excitement, the nature of arduous travel in difficult and uncharted terrain throughout a lost epoch, and the quirkiest and most stimulating of friendships, the theme is a gift, and one that has long been waiting for adequate treatment'.

Shipton and Tilman

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Jim Perrin

Praise for Shipton and Tilman

Required reading

This is witty, literate, erudite and committed writing, and I'll be surprised if this anniversary year sees a better mountaineering book.

destined to become a classic in the genre of mountaineering literature

Required reading

This is witty, literate, erudite and committed writing, and I'll be surprised if this anniversary year sees a better mountaineering book.

destined to become a classic in the genre of mountaineering literature

Required reading

This is witty, literate, erudite and committed writing, and I'll be surprised if this anniversary year sees a better mountaineering book.

destined to become a classic in the genre of mountaineering literature

Books by Jim Perrin

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