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mike b
Trad climber
Ottawa
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Dec 27, 2009 - 10:13pm PT
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This is one of the coolest threads I've read on Supertopo. Thanks guys for the awesome translations and the very interesting discussions.
mike
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Topic Author's Reply - Dec 28, 2009 - 10:08am PT
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Randisi,
I think it would be awesome if someone would use your translations in a publication.
Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be enough of us interested in what was up with that guy. There are too many bottomless trash talking arguments to have...
My hat's off to you anyway man!
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 12, 2010 - 11:40pm PT
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Wow Randisi, I haven't even seen those last couple posts.
I've got some reading to do.
I see you've been at it again!
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Topic Author's Reply - Feb 13, 2010 - 12:28pm PT
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Randisi,
Why? Has Largo shown an interest in that particular period?
Or German translations?
HA!
I'm just glad that jogill got on here.
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Broken
climber
Texas
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Feb 13, 2010 - 01:00pm PT
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I'd also like to thank the contributors to this thread. Wonderful stuff.
Thank you.
-VM
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Captain...or Skully
Social climber
شقوق واس
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Feb 13, 2010 - 04:31pm PT
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Glad to see this thread re-appear.
Thanks, Randisi!
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Feb 15, 2010 - 04:17pm PT
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Wonderful work, Randy! This will be valuable for future references and research. For those of us having an ongoing interest in the origins of our demanding sport, I thank you!
Incidentally, why don't you take a few moments and make the Preuss site on Wikipedia a bit more accurate? The six rules need to be upgraded, etc.
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Chief
climber
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May 11, 2010 - 11:10am PT
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Ausgezeichnet! Prima! Naturlich! Danke!
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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May 11, 2010 - 11:16am PT
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That is some trenchant writing! Thanks, Randisi!
I really liked:
"The love of danger is a fine and manly thing; the tasting of a danger is, once survived, a great treat that I would not like to miss; but exposing oneself to an all too obviously threatening danger is extravagant; it's a criminal game of chance with the best goods we have."
I can see why Reinhold likes Preuss:
" But correcting your own insecurity by tying yourself into pitons at every opportunity and then calling this procedure cultivating security is a great error. Its principle is not security, but securing.(1) With artificial aids just about anything can be accomplished!..."
I'm glad I didn't adhere to this gem of Preuss' or I would not have gotten beyond 4th class:
"Prospective climbers are to be instructed the keep their abilities within the bounds of their ambition,
to stand just as high in their intellectual as in their technological education, no higher and no lower."
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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May 11, 2010 - 12:20pm PT
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As we've seen Preuss criticized the use of rappelling for all but emergencies. But what was meant by rappelling at that time? Hand over hand descent of the rope? One website credits Jean Esteril Charlet with inventing rappelling in 1879 for a descent of the Petit Dru, but gives no indication as to how this was done.
Had the Dülfersitz been adopted by that time (1911)? Perhaps this new technique, making such naughty reliance on the rope even easier, partly spurred Preuss into writing his denunciation of such "artificial aids"?
Preuss opposed the use of the rope for descents, since that allowed climbers to retreat over ground they could never have actually climbed or down-climbed. He saw each rappel as a point of aid. The technique would not have mattered--
So far as technique, folks began fixing and batmanning descent ropes quite early, in the French and Swiss Alps. The Tirolians appear to have developed the doubled-rope technique, which allowed climbers to retrieve the rope after. Abseils were also popular situations for placing pitons. By 1911, when Preuss was writing, mguides like Piaz had installed fixed rappel stations on some of the most popular peaks in the Dolomites.
So no, by Preuss's ethic, climbing means climbing. It doesn't mean climbing and rappelling, or climb with just a little bit of tension, or climbing and hanging only at the belays-- it means, climbing, period.
By Preuss's lights, each and every single one of you who ploaces a piece of pro, ties into an anchor, yards a fixed line or does a single rappel, is a frickin aid climber.
heh.
That's why Huber's solo of the Swiss Route-- up and down --was an homage to Preuss.
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Alan Rubin
climber
Amherst,MA.
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May 11, 2010 - 01:24pm PT
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And that's why Preuss isn't really the founding father of "our" style (at least for the vast majority of us)as much as we'd like to think that he is.
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jogill
climber
Colorado
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Excellent, Randy. This will be one of the better climbing bios on Wikipedia.
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survival
Big Wall climber
A Token of My Extreme
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Topic Author's Reply - Jun 4, 2010 - 03:11pm PT
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Randisi,
You rock bro. That's it.
I'll have to read those big posts later, as I'm off for errands.
I love the way you have stuck with this. You have faaar outpaced any expectation I had.
Thanks,
B
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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my guiding light through all mountaineering controversy:
bergsteiger sind eigenwillig und hartnäckig. jeder ist ein scharfumriße, kantige persönlichkeit.
--heinrich harrer
so you get used to being one yourself and try to get along with others.
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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good translation, randisi.
please don't get preussy over the jewish-nazi thing. even if you subscribe to the standard version, you ought to know that harrer underwent some real changes in his own life and attitudes during his seven years in tibet.
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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you're talking to a fellow who knows a little too much about world war 2. but whatever your take on that, don't project the troubles of that time back on a guy who died in 1913.
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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those who admire mountaineers don't know them real well. you'll find that, up close, each is willful and stubborn, a sharply defined, angular personality. kinda like fred becky out there--he'll steal your climbs, he'll steal your women, don't let him steal your crazy creek chair!
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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too much for me to read, randi. when royal robbins tried to become the pope of climbing out here, people started ignoring him.
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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that's interesting. the english are always teddibly civilized, except at their soccer games, and when dealing with the irish, of course.
i picked up the poems of christina rosetti about a week ago--was always curious about her. i'm half american of english descent and half italian fireball (it's why i know too much about world war 2), and i figured christina's poetry might have some resonance. she was 3/4 italian but totally english, always being tugged towards her sanguine roots, fighting it all the way. to a visiting italian friend she wrote:
"... if she found us like our sea,
"of aspect colorless and chill,
"rock-girt; like it, she found us still
"deep at our deepest, strong and free."
it's impossible to resist the temptation to feel superior, especially if you live on an island.
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Tony Bird
climber
Northridge, CA
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i'm saving that stuff for a quiet morning at the old climber's home. nice work though, really. if you're looking for a publisher, consider the madness of self-publishing.
also appreciated the dolomite views earlier in this thread and the early 20th century climbers, german, austrian, italian. i climbed in the dolos a few years back. great place, great memories.
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