Seven Years in Tibet

Heinrich Harrer was born in 1912 in Carinthia. His skiing prowess won him a place in the 1936 Austrian Olympic team. He was part of the team that first scaled the notorious North Face of the Eiger in 1938, an adventure recounted in his book The White Spider. He died in 2006.

'It deserves its place among the few great travel stories of our times.' The Times 'This is an absorbing and remarkable travel tale that also gives unparalleled accounts of the life and customs of an inaccessible region.' Sunday Times 'Few adventurers in this century have had the combined luck and hardihood to return with such news as this. Fewer still have rendered it so powerfully unadorned.' Times Literary Supplement 'Some books, like some mountains, are lonely and unrivalled peaks. This is one of them.' Economist