White Mountain

A sweeping biography of the Himalayas by the acclaimed author of Angry White Pyjamas.

Home to mythical kingdoms, wars and expeditions, and strange and magical beasts, the Himalayas have always loomed tall in our imagination. These mountains, home to Buddhists, Bonpos, Jains, Muslims, Hindus, shamans, and animists, to name only a few, are a place of pilgrimage and dreams, revelation and war, massacre and invasion, but also peace and unutterable calm. They are a central hub of the world’s religion, as well as a climber’s challenge and a traveler’s dream. In an exploration of the region's seismic history, Robert Twigger, author of Red Nile and Angry White Pyjamas, unravels some of these seemingly disparate journeys and the unexpected links between them. Following a winding path across the Himalayas to its physical end in Nagaland on the Indian-Burmese border, Twigger encounters incredible stories from a unique cast of mountaineers and mystics, pundits and prophets. The result is a sweeping, enthralling and surprising journey through the history of the world's greatest mountain range.

Robert Twigger is a British author, poet and adventurer. He attended Oxford University and has been awarded the Newdigate Prize for poetry, the Somerset Maugham Award for Literature and the William Hill Sports Book of the Year Award. He led the expedition that was the first to cross the Great Sand Sea of the Egyptian Sahara solely on foot, and another that was the first to cross Western Canada in a birchbark canoe since 1793. He is the author of nine books, both fiction and non-fiction.  Visit him at www.roberttwigger.com