Picture This

As Jon Krakauer tries to figure out his implication in the 1996 Mt. Everest disaster, he tips precariously on the edge of a great void of grief and guilt. Krakauer is haunted by the loss of life that occurred and wants to find peace with himself through examining what about Everest makes people ignore caution and sanity to seek out the of their wildest dreams. In the not so great picture that I drew, a climber who I envision to be Krakauer, dangling from a slim ledge, about to fall into the Void of Guilt. Below him are the things that cause him grief; his implication in the disaster, the deaths of his friends, what he could have done to alleviate the damage done, etc. The mountain that he hangs on is Mt. Everest, but it symbolizes coping with the sorrow that came with the 1996 tragedy. At the end of Into Thin Air, Krakauer tells of his experiences in dealing with the blow, and the successes and failures of others to handle their mourning. He realizes that there were things that he could not prevent, and learns to deal with himself, yet recognizes that his presence as a journalist may have pressured expeditions to continue to the top even as conditions deteriorated.