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Title: Reinhold Messner Free Spirit a Climbers by Reinhold Messner, Jill Neate ISBN: 0-89886-290-6 Publisher: Mountaineers Books Pub. Date: 01 June, 1991 Format: Hardcover Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $24.95

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Average Customer Rating: 3.33 (6 reviews)

Rating: 5
Summary: The alpine icon
Comment: The achievements of Reinhold Messner are legendary. Among them, he is the first man to have ascended Mount Everest without supplemental oxygen. He is also the first man to have climbed all fourteen 8000-meter peaks. Mr. Messner could rightfully be quite boastful and egotistic in his writing. Exactly the opposite is true. The book was panned by a number of reviewers for being "dry". This is precisely why I find the book so engaging and interesting. Mr. Messner narrates his achievements in a matter of fact manner leaving the reader to fill in the enormity of his spirit. Personally, I find the single-minded obsession of mountain climbers to be somewhat bizarre. Yet, I find reading about the tales of misery and death to be entertaining. I admire Mr. Messner for his unbridled enthusiam for mountain climbing and also for his restraint in narrating the tales.

Rating: 3
Summary: Reads like a rapid overview
Comment: Messner's account of the early years of a remarkable climbing career skips over each individual ascent so quickly that the reader loses interest. While his writing in itself is not unskilled, the rapid descriptions make the book read like a laundry list. Also, while his puritanical philosophy of mountaineering must have its roots in this early period, he mentions its development only in passing. Despite some gorgeous photographs, this book does not approach the best of its kind.

Rating: 3
Summary: A rather dry account of one of the world's best mountaineers
Comment: Free Spirit could have, potentially, been a incredible account of a brilliant mountaineering career. Instead, during the course of the book, one can picture Messner sitting down 20 years later in an attempt to remember exactly how he felt during his numerous expeditions and bold first ascents.

Although the book starts out well enough with fond memories of his childhood in the Dolomites, it quickly degrades into a fact-fest of unemotional paragraphs that will disappoint. How anyone can describe their first ascent of Everest without oxygen, or the death of a brother in so few words is amazing; if not degrading.

Your climbing collection will not miss this volume.