In reply to UKC/UKH Gear:
thanks for the recommendations! that is a good mix and yet still all very much on topic.
i just recently finished david smart’s royal robbins biography and was quite taken. very readable, and makes a good attempt at making robbins understandable, at different points of his life. i also liked that while it would’ve been easy to just go with how important a role in climbing he played and hang everything off the size of his legend, it didn’t shy away from also telling of less favourable turns later in his life (re environmentalism, for example).
also, a nice fleshing out of his relation to harding for all who only saw the rivalry in valley uprising.