If you are in the Scottish hills one winter’s day and you see a Victorian climber step cutting his way up an ice gully don’t panic, you’re not seeing a ghost and haven’t inadvertently walked into a glen lost in the mists of time. It’s just Alex Roddie, mountaineer, author and Victorian climbing enthusiast reliving one of the great climbs of yester year.
This is a cyber-interview with Alex. As a fellow outdoors writer I’m always keen to explore new talent and in this conversation Alex talks about his unique fictional take on the Golden Era of mountaineering.
John: How did you become interested in Victorian Mountaineers?
Alex: I read "The White Spider" by Heinrich Harrer - the classic account of the first ascent of the North Face of the Eiger in 1938. This remarkable book, while not quite touching on the Victorian period, ignited my interest in the history of climbing and helped me realise what an enormous depth of culture and heritage underpins the modern world of mountaineering.
From that point on I devoured every book I could find on the history of climbing, gradually going backwards in time but with a strong focus on the 1860s - 1910s. More recently my research has tended towards the 1790s - 1840s. I've studied the 1940s and 1950s to a lesser extent, notably the works of W.H. Murray, but this period doesn't hold my interest to such an extent largely because the climbing world was starting to come under the sway of modernisation and the earlier romantic ideals were waning. The 19th century pioneers left a huge legacy of written work behind them, and we're lucky to be able to dive effortlessly into their world from the distant perspective of the 21st century.
John: What made you think it would be a good subject for fiction?
Read more here.
http://johndburns.wordpress.com/2013/07/22/re-living-ther-golden-age-with-a...
