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The Frozen River: Seeking Silence in the Himalaya
‘A wonderful book, otherworldly, full of the ecstasies and revelations of true isolation and hardship.’ Philip Marsden, author of Rising Ground
‘A luminous book, exquisite in its depiction, profound in its rhymes of ice and mind. Jay Griffiths, author of Wild
’Imagine if your family had lived in the mountains for a thousand years or more, what effect would that have upon your mind and your thinking?’
In 1976 James Crowden left his career in the British army and travelled to Ladakh in the Northern Himalaya, one of the most remote parts of the world. The Frozen River is his extraordinary account of the time he spent there, living alongside the Zangskari people, before the arrival of roads and mass tourism.
James immerses himself in the Zangskari way of life, where meditation and week-long mountain festivals go hand in hand, and silence and solitude are the hallmarks of existence. When butter traders invite James on their journey down the frozen river Leh, he soon realises that this way of living, unchanged for centuries, comes with a very human cost.
In lyrical prose, James captures a crucial moment in time for this Himalayan community. A moment in which their Buddhist practices and traditions are in flux, and the economic pull of a world beyond their valley is increasingly difficult to ignore.
‘A luminous book, exquisite in its depiction, profound in its rhymes of ice and mind. Jay Griffiths, author of Wild
’Imagine if your family had lived in the mountains for a thousand years or more, what effect would that have upon your mind and your thinking?’
In 1976 James Crowden left his career in the British army and travelled to Ladakh in the Northern Himalaya, one of the most remote parts of the world. The Frozen River is his extraordinary account of the time he spent there, living alongside the Zangskari people, before the arrival of roads and mass tourism.
James immerses himself in the Zangskari way of life, where meditation and week-long mountain festivals go hand in hand, and silence and solitude are the hallmarks of existence. When butter traders invite James on their journey down the frozen river Leh, he soon realises that this way of living, unchanged for centuries, comes with a very human cost.
In lyrical prose, James captures a crucial moment in time for this Himalayan community. A moment in which their Buddhist practices and traditions are in flux, and the economic pull of a world beyond their valley is increasingly difficult to ignore.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published January 23, 2020
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278 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews
December 23, 2022
As a young man, the author travelled to Ladakh in the Northern Himalayas to experience life there. This was in the 1970s, before roads had reached the area which is nowadays a popular hiking centre. He doesn’t tell us why he took time out to go there or why it took him 40 years to write a book about his trip. His living conditions were spartan and the winter temperatures were severe but he was recently out of the army, and just a young man, so he was tough enough to bear it. It does often seem like he’s doing penance for something. The highlight of his story is his walk down the frozen river with local butter traders, a long and dangerous route but the only one at that time.
The book would have benefited from more explanations of local words, the meaning of which we were often left to find out for ourselves. Thank goodness for Google! It would have been a more personal, insightful journey if we had learned why he was there. He alludes to difficulties in his life so we imagine he needed to sort himself out but why? All in all though, it’s an interesting and enjoyable account.
The book would have benefited from more explanations of local words, the meaning of which we were often left to find out for ourselves. Thank goodness for Google! It would have been a more personal, insightful journey if we had learned why he was there. He alludes to difficulties in his life so we imagine he needed to sort himself out but why? All in all though, it’s an interesting and enjoyable account.
October 4, 2023
I tried really hard with this book. I like a lyrical, slightly pretentious travel memoir; I think Goodreads recommended this to me after I read The Old Ways. But while I'm sure there was an interesting story buried somewhere in this book, the tedium and self-absorption of the narrative was matched only by the robotic yet randomly over-emphatic narration in the audiobook version. I never DNF books, but I only got past the prologue of this by using it as a cure for insomnia. Skip this and read The Old Ways if you want a poetic travelogue or 14 Peaks / Touching The Void if you want a mountaineering memoir.
April 16, 2021
At first I decided not to read this book. I've had more than enough of isolation after months of lockdown without going forth into the mountain wilderness. However, curiosity and an interest in mindfulness prevailed, and I'm just emerging from several hours of ploughing through what has turned out to be all too appropriately heavy going. I suppose as these are journeys I'm never likely to make, experiencing them at second hand can only be a good thing. However, I'm finding James Crowden's awkward, staccato style and tendency to wander off the point and repeat himself are barriers to the clarity of understanding he so admires.
August 5, 2023
Fascinating subject matter and Crowden had the opportunity to produce a great, authoritative book on Ladakh/Zanskar. However, it was incredibly slow, hard to follow, ridiculously repetitive and overall a product of poor writing - the type an oxford undergrad would produce 45 minutes before their tutorial. Disappointed
March 1, 2022
An exquisite, slow paced memoir of the authors time in remote Ladakh in the Himalayas, to spend winter with the Zangskari people who lived there.
The frozen river is a blend of nature writing, winter mountaineering, Tibetan culture, history and Buddhism, all the while seeking solitude and surrendering to a slower way of life.
“Winter, winter. A time of gathering in, of holding close, of paring down, of minimal movement, of unfolding hibernation. Time without boundaries, which in its own way cultivated a richness and a sensitivity that had been buried within me for many years, a deep sense of returning, of coming home at last. I was remote yet perfectly at peace with myself.”
The frozen river is a blend of nature writing, winter mountaineering, Tibetan culture, history and Buddhism, all the while seeking solitude and surrendering to a slower way of life.
“Winter, winter. A time of gathering in, of holding close, of paring down, of minimal movement, of unfolding hibernation. Time without boundaries, which in its own way cultivated a richness and a sensitivity that had been buried within me for many years, a deep sense of returning, of coming home at last. I was remote yet perfectly at peace with myself.”
March 22, 2020
This memoir of a young Englishman’s winter in a remote valley in the Himalaya is simply marvelous. James Crowden brings you with him as he experiences life in a remote, harsh environment and finds transcendent beauty in the mountains, the people, their culture and allure of Buddhist philosophy.
The book is the second I’ve received from Heywood Hill, the London bookshop, as part of their “A Year in Books” program. A Christmas gift from my wife, Heywood Hill sends a book each month personally selected to appeal to my reading interests. The first book I received from Heywood Hill was “Breathe” by Dominick Donald, which I also enjoyed. This is a wonderful service and a great gift idea, for yourself or someone you know who loves to read.
February 7, 2024
I wanted to love this, but it was a struggle to get through, largely due to the author's constant need to share what he was (allegedly) thinking at the time. His 40-year-old diaries must have been very comprehensive.
I found that the chatty style of Crowden's inner monologue intrusive against the lyrical descriptions of Ladakh and its people. Ultimately, this spoiled the silence for me.
I found that the chatty style of Crowden's inner monologue intrusive against the lyrical descriptions of Ladakh and its people. Ultimately, this spoiled the silence for me.
December 6, 2022
dnf around 1/2way
did not vibe with the writing...every sentence felt like a fever dream
did not vibe with the writing...every sentence felt like a fever dream
January 22, 2021
Spellbinding account of a winter spent by the author in Zanskar in 1976, when he was 22, and compiled from notes into this book 40 years later. Ladakh and Zanskar are magical Himalayan lands, that were still somewhat suspended in time at the time of the author's visit, with no road yet built into Zanskar. It was a remote, harsh place to live where the people were (and still are) very poor and the economy (at least at the time) ran on barter. Gompas (Tibetan Buddhist monasteries) at the time had the same relationship with their patron villages as has been the case historically, for good or bad.
The author undertakes several hard treks -- first into the Zanskar valley, then the "Chadar" ('icesheet') trek over the frozen Zanskar river from Zanskar valley to Leh and back, and a final solo ski trip from Zanskar valley to Rangdom (extremely dangerous, with bears, wolves and snow leopards on the prowl, frequent avalanches and the author managing to misplace his bag of food for the last two days of the trek) and describes all the little turns of fortuitous luck and misfortune on the trip. You really get a sense of how cold and desolate it is. I'm lucky to have travelled to Ladakh several times (though not to Zanskar yet) and the cold really is unforgiving with temperatures dipping from 20C to -20C in 40 minutes as soon as the sun sets.
Although Zanskar is still hard to reach in the winter as all the passes close and the only way (other than renting a helicopter) is via the Chadar trek, climate change has now made the Chadar trek much more dangerous as the river doesn't freeze as much as it did, so the ice is prone to breaking and in the past few years some fatal accidents have happened. Ladakh is inundated with tourists, and there is a developing military situation between India and China which means more and more places will be closed for tourism. The biggest danger is that the glaciers are shrinking, and along with them will go the only source of water in the summer for humans, animals and agriculture. We should be grateful for the few books such as this that document to some extent the way things used to be.
The author undertakes several hard treks -- first into the Zanskar valley, then the "Chadar" ('icesheet') trek over the frozen Zanskar river from Zanskar valley to Leh and back, and a final solo ski trip from Zanskar valley to Rangdom (extremely dangerous, with bears, wolves and snow leopards on the prowl, frequent avalanches and the author managing to misplace his bag of food for the last two days of the trek) and describes all the little turns of fortuitous luck and misfortune on the trip. You really get a sense of how cold and desolate it is. I'm lucky to have travelled to Ladakh several times (though not to Zanskar yet) and the cold really is unforgiving with temperatures dipping from 20C to -20C in 40 minutes as soon as the sun sets.
Although Zanskar is still hard to reach in the winter as all the passes close and the only way (other than renting a helicopter) is via the Chadar trek, climate change has now made the Chadar trek much more dangerous as the river doesn't freeze as much as it did, so the ice is prone to breaking and in the past few years some fatal accidents have happened. Ladakh is inundated with tourists, and there is a developing military situation between India and China which means more and more places will be closed for tourism. The biggest danger is that the glaciers are shrinking, and along with them will go the only source of water in the summer for humans, animals and agriculture. We should be grateful for the few books such as this that document to some extent the way things used to be.
December 21, 2025
This is an anthropological journal, not a travel adventure. While the traverse down the frozen river serves a backdrop, and indeed a few of the chapters focus on the journey itself, it is truthfully the authors memoirs on the journey. This takes place through a collection of anecdotes telling of the places visited and the people who inhabit these places.
It is a dry recollection, but one that as a reader, I connected with. These aren't places and people who are superheroes, world wonders, or the like; they are ones that on this particular journey, the author connected with and were important to him. As someone who is lucky to be able to travel fairly frequently, I connected with this mantra. Even though not every anecdote connected, and even if some were downright pedestrian, it is their prominence in the author's mind that kept me pushing through.
It is also the author's overall mantra on the journey that connected with me. I noted a quote that really resonated having traveled solo the last few years:
How well put, Mr. Crowden. And at the end of the day, it is this pushing of our boundaries and the anecdotes of places and people that make travel such a fulfilling activity. And with that philosophy in mind, while the book will likely not appeal to the masses, it appealed well enough to me.
It is a dry recollection, but one that as a reader, I connected with. These aren't places and people who are superheroes, world wonders, or the like; they are ones that on this particular journey, the author connected with and were important to him. As someone who is lucky to be able to travel fairly frequently, I connected with this mantra. Even though not every anecdote connected, and even if some were downright pedestrian, it is their prominence in the author's mind that kept me pushing through.
It is also the author's overall mantra on the journey that connected with me. I noted a quote that really resonated having traveled solo the last few years:
Solo Expeditions have a particular flavour all of their own. For a start you have no one to talk to but yourself. No one else sets the agenda, so you make what you can of the world in front of you. You think you know your limits but you are keen to test the boundaries.
How well put, Mr. Crowden. And at the end of the day, it is this pushing of our boundaries and the anecdotes of places and people that make travel such a fulfilling activity. And with that philosophy in mind, while the book will likely not appeal to the masses, it appealed well enough to me.
January 10, 2022
I think this is a wonderful book. As others have described, and like Patrick Leigh Fermor’s writings, it was written long after the journey he describes. Despite this I felt I was almost with him during the journey down the frozen river.
An afterword gives some hint of the changes in terms of road access, development, and climate change that have happened in the last 40 years.
So it is a lens into the relatively recent past and how subsistence communities survived in conditions of great hardship and with the help of the clear obligations within the system of Tibetan Buddhism, which he describes in rich and fascinating detail.
He also describes the fierce and pervasive cold which is almost a character in the book.
I have trekked in Nepal, and this book makes me want to head for Ladakh and Zanskar !
An afterword gives some hint of the changes in terms of road access, development, and climate change that have happened in the last 40 years.
So it is a lens into the relatively recent past and how subsistence communities survived in conditions of great hardship and with the help of the clear obligations within the system of Tibetan Buddhism, which he describes in rich and fascinating detail.
He also describes the fierce and pervasive cold which is almost a character in the book.
I have trekked in Nepal, and this book makes me want to head for Ladakh and Zanskar !
January 21, 2022
Like many of the best travel books this portrays a society on the cusp of change, as a metalled road is being driven into the Himalayan kingdom of Ladakh, politically a part of India. The frozen river in the title was until the 1970s the easiest, or at least the fastest way to reach the southern parts of Ladakh, using the icebound Zangskar River as a road for the most intrepid traders, Buddhist monks, and villagers to reach the capital, Leh, from the mountain valleys. Unforgettable portraits of the villagers, the austere but beautiful landscape, the sustaining power of Buddhism, and of the author himself, who lived in the region in the mid-70s. Highly recommended
December 18, 2020
I loved this book. Zanskar is an exotic and wonderful place. It is a bit like Patrick Leigh Fermor where the book is written a long time after the events, but what it loses in immediacy it makes up for in the quality of writing. It allows the impetuosity of youth to be mixed with the wisdom of middle age. The first couple of pages with the description of ice ferns are lyrical. There is also the poignancy that the world this book describes has been changed forever by the arrival of the road. best travel book I have read in 2020 by a country mile.
August 22, 2024
A great project.
A young soldier left his employment in order to experience the silence among the rural people of the Himalyan foothills.
I read the book with great expectations. For I myself is in a spiritual quest.
Writer was not experienced in written communication, this being his first writing endeavour. Keeping that in mind, this is a very good account of a great project.
I recommend this book for readers who are atuned to the slow but everchanging nature.
A young soldier left his employment in order to experience the silence among the rural people of the Himalyan foothills.
I read the book with great expectations. For I myself is in a spiritual quest.
Writer was not experienced in written communication, this being his first writing endeavour. Keeping that in mind, this is a very good account of a great project.
I recommend this book for readers who are atuned to the slow but everchanging nature.
April 17, 2025
I struggled with much of this book, not the subject matter but rather the writing style and odd structure that is roughly chroniclogical but with tangents galore.
The insight into the landscape and people was fascinating, but the philosophical insights around Buddhist thought were where I thought this book really shone.
It could have been shorted and better organised but it still made me think plenty which is always a sign of something worthwhile.
The insight into the landscape and people was fascinating, but the philosophical insights around Buddhist thought were where I thought this book really shone.
It could have been shorted and better organised but it still made me think plenty which is always a sign of something worthwhile.
April 26, 2021
Époustouflant! Loved every minute of it. The author brings you right there every step of the way. Incredible memoir and beautifully narrated. I had to look at maps and images as I was so ensconced in the story and wanted to see Padum and the frozen river.
May 15, 2021
A beautiful travelogue. The experience he had almost half a century back riding a rickety bus across the Zojila pass, takes you for a time capsule ride. Wanna know about Zanskar and life of people there? Read this.
February 9, 2025
I enjoyed reading this book . It was beautifully written and a good insight into life in this part of Ladakh, although he does sound a little naive at times! But he was very young when he made the trip and wrote the book many years later.
June 11, 2021
Engrossing tale. Well written, great descriptions, fascinating undertaking.
April 16, 2025
Absolutely serene
May 30, 2020
Superb, I am trekking through the Himalayan Ice! I thoroughly enjoyed this excellent story of a winter in the Himalaya. James Crowded captures the awe inspiring region and people immersing you in their lives and culture while giving you the thrill of true adventure. Hope he has many more tales to tell.
Perhaps more on the devastation being caused by climate change in the region?
Perhaps more on the devastation being caused by climate change in the region?
May 31, 2021
"This winter silence was addictive. Muffled by snow, the whole village fell silent. The silence kept us whole, it kept us fresh, it kept us alive, and we fed on the silence as if it were an essential part of our diet, a rare commodity that is traded in the mountains, more precious than gold, silence that had evolved within their culture, a silence that the Buddhists deeply respected. Mountain silence. A very particular silence that was clearly under threat from road building."
Truly beautiful! This book provides insight into a world that has rapidly changed.
Truly beautiful! This book provides insight into a world that has rapidly changed.
February 16, 2021
If you were looking for the perfect book to read whilst in your 3rd lockdown, trying to work from home and home school children then this might be it!
Beautifully written, the words are well chosen, small snippets of human life are scattered through descriptions of a world totally different to ours. Written after a visit to the area in the 1970s the author leaves you in no doubt that enormous changes will have now happened in the valley - more human interaction and the effects of climate change - he has since revisited and add notes as such. A wonderful book - wish he had written more.
Beautifully written, the words are well chosen, small snippets of human life are scattered through descriptions of a world totally different to ours. Written after a visit to the area in the 1970s the author leaves you in no doubt that enormous changes will have now happened in the valley - more human interaction and the effects of climate change - he has since revisited and add notes as such. A wonderful book - wish he had written more.
August 4, 2021
This recounts an amazingseries of jouirneys, physical and spiritual, to places in many ways unchanged by time but also being erased by the modern world. The sense of cold, isolation, community and humanity are beautifully set down. Noone who reads this book can be unchanged by it.
Displaying 1 - 24 of 24 reviews