remus

	Country	Contributions	Between	Climbers	Crags	Summits	Climbs	Ascents
1	United Kingdom	53140	14th November 2023 – 2nd October 2026	1423	699	0	3072	4895
2	USA	24597	14th November 2023 – 30th September 2026	795	181	2	848	2357
3	France	12148	14th November 2023 – 1st October 2026	264	126	1	551	1032
4	Switzerland	9430	14th November 2023 – 29th September 2026	77	43	1	307	1105
5	Spain	8349	15th November 2023 – 26th September 2026	89	74	0	443	896
6	Italy	4632	16th November 2023 – 1st October 2026	118	59	0	184	358
7	South Africa	3656	16th November 2023 – 28th September 2026	12	35	0	128	394
8	Canada	3153	16th November 2023 – 1st October 2026	63	21	3	108	269
9	Germany	3101	16th November 2023 – 25th September 2026	116	48	0	103	224
10	Austria	2544	16th November 2023 – 30th September 2026	70	26	0	105	224

	Date	Time	User	Type	Name	Attribute
7261	5th September 2026	17:40:49 UTC	remus	library item	Dosage Vol. I	Volume
Before `None` After `1`
7262	5th September 2026	17:40:49 UTC	remus	library item	Dosage Vol. III	Volume
Before `None` After `3`
7263	5th September 2026	17:31:48 UTC	remus	library item	Climbers' Club 1898 Vol.1 No.4 Journal	transcript (Mistral)
Before `None` After `101,814 chars`
7264	5th September 2026	17:08:40 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	transcript (Whisper (turbo))
Before `None` After `466,123 chars`
7265	5th September 2026	15:52:18 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	notes
Before Kelly Cordes reading his own book, The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript. The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children. About the book The Tower is a history of Cerro Torre, the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that Reinhold Messner once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: Cesare Maestri's disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner Toni Egger died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, David Lama's free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism. Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 The Tower won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category. About the author Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the American Alpine Journal from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for Alpinist, Climbing, Rock and Ice and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After The Tower he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir The Push (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado. The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website. After Kelly Cordes reading his own book, The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript. The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children. About the book The Tower is a history of [Cerro Torre](/summit/28/cerro-torre), the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that [Reinhold Messner](/climber/2415/reinhold-messner) once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: [Cesare Maestri's](/climber/1732/cesare-maestri) disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner [Toni Egger](/climber/1733/toni-egger) died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by [Hayden Kennedy](/climber/1187/hayden-kennedy) and [Jason Kruk](/climber/3270/jason-kruk) in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, [David Lama's](/climber/1073/david-lama) free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism. Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 The Tower won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category. About the author Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the American Alpine Journal from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for Alpinist, Climbing, Rock and Ice and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After The Tower he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir The Push (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado. The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website. Diff --- before +++ after @@ -1,16 +1,16 @@ -Kelly Cordes reading his own book, The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript. +Kelly Cordes reading his own book, The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript. + +The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children. + +About the book + +The Tower is a history of [Cerro Torre](/summit/28/cerro-torre), the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that [Reinhold Messner](/climber/2415/reinhold-messner) once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: [Cesare Maestri's](/climber/1732/cesare-maestri) disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner [Toni Egger](/climber/1733/toni-egger) died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by [Hayden Kennedy](/climber/1187/hayden-kennedy) and [Jason Kruk](/climber/3270/jason-kruk) in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, [David Lama's](/climber/1073/david-lama) free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism. + +Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 The Tower won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category. + +About the author + +Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the American Alpine Journal from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for Alpinist, Climbing, Rock and Ice and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After The Tower he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir The Push (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado. + +The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website. -The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children. - -About the book - -The Tower is a history of Cerro Torre, the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that Reinhold Messner once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: Cesare Maestri's disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner Toni Egger died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, David Lama's free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism. - -Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 The Tower won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category. - -About the author - -Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the American Alpine Journal from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for Alpinist, Climbing, Rock and Ice and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After The Tower he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir The Push (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado. - -The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website. -
7266	5th September 2026	15:52:18 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	notes_pretty
Before <p>Kelly Cordes reading his own book, <em>The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre</em> (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript.</p> <p>The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children.</p> <p><strong>About the book</strong></p> <p><em>The Tower</em> is a history of Cerro Torre, the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that Reinhold Messner once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: Cesare Maestri's disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner Toni Egger died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, David Lama's free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism.</p> <p>Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 <em>The Tower</em> won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category.</p> <p><strong>About the author</strong></p> <p>Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the <em>American Alpine Journal</em> from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for <em>Alpinist</em>, <em>Climbing</em>, <em>Rock and Ice</em> and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After <em>The Tower</em> he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir <em>The Push</em> (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado.</p> <p>The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website.</p> After <p>Kelly Cordes reading his own book, <em>The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre</em> (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript.</p> <p>The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children.</p> <p><strong>About the book</strong></p> <p><em>The Tower</em> is a history of <a href="/summit/28/cerro-torre" rel="noopener noreferrer">Cerro Torre</a>, the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that <a href="/climber/2415/reinhold-messner" rel="noopener noreferrer">Reinhold Messner</a> once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: <a href="/climber/1732/cesare-maestri" rel="noopener noreferrer">Cesare Maestri's</a> disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner <a href="/climber/1733/toni-egger" rel="noopener noreferrer">Toni Egger</a> died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by <a href="/climber/1187/hayden-kennedy" rel="noopener noreferrer">Hayden Kennedy</a> and <a href="/climber/3270/jason-kruk" rel="noopener noreferrer">Jason Kruk</a> in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, <a href="/climber/1073/david-lama" rel="noopener noreferrer">David Lama's</a> free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism.</p> <p>Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 <em>The Tower</em> won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category.</p> <p><strong>About the author</strong></p> <p>Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the <em>American Alpine Journal</em> from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for <em>Alpinist</em>, <em>Climbing</em>, <em>Rock and Ice</em> and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After <em>The Tower</em> he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir <em>The Push</em> (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado.</p> <p>The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website.</p>
7267	5th September 2026	15:52:18 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	library_item_type_id
Before `16` After `5`
7268	5th September 2026	15:50:10 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	Crag Features
Before `None` After `34096`
7269	5th September 2026	15:45:49 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	Author
Before `None` After `Kelly Cordes`
7270	5th September 2026	15:45:46 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	notes
Before `None` After Kelly Cordes reading his own book, The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript. The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children. About the book The Tower is a history of Cerro Torre, the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that Reinhold Messner once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: Cesare Maestri's disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner Toni Egger died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, David Lama's free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism. Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 The Tower won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category. About the author Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the American Alpine Journal from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for Alpinist, Climbing, Rock and Ice and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After The Tower he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir The Push (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado. The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website. Diff --- before +++ after @@ -1 +1,16 @@ +Kelly Cordes reading his own book, The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript. +The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children. + +About the book + +The Tower is a history of Cerro Torre, the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that Reinhold Messner once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: Cesare Maestri's disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner Toni Egger died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, David Lama's free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism. + +Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 The Tower won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category. + +About the author + +Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the American Alpine Journal from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for Alpinist, Climbing, Rock and Ice and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After The Tower he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir The Push (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado. + +The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website. +
7271	5th September 2026	15:45:46 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	notes_pretty
Before `None` After <p>Kelly Cordes reading his own book, <em>The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre</em> (Patagonia Books, 2014), in full. Cordes recorded it at home in Estes Park, Colorado, during the spring 2020 coronavirus lockdown ("this bizarre time makes a good time for storytime") with technical help from his friend Jason Albert, and released it free on his website as an introduction plus sixteen episodes of roughly 20 to 50 minutes each. Those episodes have been spliced together here into a single recording of about nine and a half hours, running from the introduction through to the epilogue and postscript.</p> <p>The reading is unabridged and uncensored. Cordes warns listeners about "the hiccups, the sips from my marg, and the wind outside my window", admits his pronunciation of foreign words is "atrocious", and notes that the book contains plenty of swearing in its quotations, so it is not really one for children.</p> <p><strong>About the book</strong></p> <p><em>The Tower</em> is a history of Cerro Torre, the granite and rime-ice spire on the edge of the Southern Patagonian Ice Field that Reinhold Messner once called a "shriek turned to stone". It centres on the mountain's three great controversies: Cesare Maestri's disputed claim to the first ascent in 1959, on which his partner Toni Egger died and for which no evidence has ever been found above the lower part of the route; Maestri's return in 1970 with a petrol-powered compressor to drill some 400 bolts up the south-east ridge, creating the Compressor Route; and the removal of most of those bolts by Hayden Kennedy and Jason Kruk in January 2012, after their fair-means ascent of the ridge, which reignited the argument over who has the right to alter a mountain. Along the way it covers the Ragni di Lecco's 1974 first undisputed ascent by the west face, David Lama's free climb of the south-east ridge in 2012, the campaign for and against the compressor bolts, and the wider question of what role equipment should play in alpinism.</p> <p>Cordes spent several years on the book, interviewing people in seven countries and working from original documents dating back to the 1950s. The finished text runs to roughly 77,000 words with appendices, a 256-entry bibliography and around 150 photographs. In 2015 <em>The Tower</em> won the Banff Mountain Book Award for Mountain and Wilderness Literature (Non-Fiction, the Jon Whyte Award) and the National Outdoor Book Award in the same category.</p> <p><strong>About the author</strong></p> <p>Kelly Cordes is an American alpinist and writer. He was an editor of the <em>American Alpine Journal</em> from 2000 to 2012 and has written widely for <em>Alpinist</em>, <em>Climbing</em>, <em>Rock and Ice</em> and Patagonia. His own climbs include the first ascent of the Azeem Ridge on Great Trango Tower in Pakistan with Josh Wharton in 2004, the first link-up of the Marsigny–Parkin route and the Ragni route on Cerro Torre with Colin Haley in 2007, and many new routes in Alaska and Peru, often in the lightweight, under-equipped "disaster style" he jokes about. After <em>The Tower</em> he co-wrote Tommy Caldwell's memoir <em>The Push</em> (2017). He lives in Estes Park, Colorado.</p> <p>The original episodes remain available to stream and download from Cordes' website.</p>
7272	5th September 2026	15:45:46 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	library_item_name
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7273	5th September 2026	15:45:46 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	url_public
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7274	5th September 2026	15:45:46 UTC	remus	library item	The Tower: A Chronicle of Climbing and Controversy on Cerro Torre	year
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7276	5th September 2026	15:23:01 UTC	remus	climber	Alex Honnold	Features In (Youtube Vid)
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7277	5th September 2026	06:20:20 UTC	remus	library item	Alpine Journal 2000 373 Notes for Contributors	transcript (Mistral)
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7278	4th September 2026	11:03:38 UTC	remus	climb	Gillette	crag_id
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7279	4th September 2026	11:03:38 UTC	remus	climb	Gillette	crag_name
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7280	4th September 2026	11:03:30 UTC	remus	crag	Ciof	crag_name
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