George Mallory Quotes

“Looking out of a tent door into a world of snow and vanishing hopes. ~George Mallory”
― Conrad Anker, The Lost Explorer: Finding Mallory on Mt. Everest

“On June 1 George told Ruth it would have been 'unbearable' to miss the final attempt. His frostbitten fingers might suffer further damage, but he declared: 'The game is worth a finger.”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“. . .There is nothing to complain of. . .we had a gorgeous day for the climb, almost windless and brilliantly fine, yet we were unable to get to the summit. So we have no excuse - we have been beaten in fair fight; beaten by the height of the mountain, and by our own shortness of breath. But the fight was worth it, worth it every time, and we shall cherish the privilege of defeat by the world's greatest mountain.”
― Howard Somervell

“Everest itself was the only mountain which we could see without turning our gaze downwards…”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“The most notable event of George's U.S. tour, at least in the public mind, consisted of a four-word quote that has been ascribed to him as his answer to the question: why do you want to climb Everest? George's reply, 'Because it is there,' has been used to represent an existential urge, felt by all mountaineers, to achieve a goal that is both physical and spiritual.”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“In a letter George had recalled the death of Donald Robertson, writing of 'the great sleeping ones that have but to stir in their slumber... Do you know that sickening feeling that one can't go back and have it undone and nothing will make good?”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“Everest is the highest mountain in the world, and no man has reached its summit. Its existence is a challenge. The answer is instinctive, a part, I suppose of man's desire to conquer the universe. (Quoting George Mallory)”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“I suppose we go to Mount Everest, granted the opportunity, because-in a word-we can't help it.' George had written. 'Or, to state the matter differently, because we are mountaineers.”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“It is of course possible to give more elaborate answers to the perennial question: why climb? In his writing and lectures, George described the spirit of adventure, confronting and managing risk, winning admiration; even, he confessed, the desire to be proclaimed a hero. His love for the wild places was manifest, as was his delight in the inner journey that accompanies an ascent.”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“Their three remaining porters returned to the North Col, leaving Norton and Somervell to contemplate an awesome panorama of peaks silhouetted against the red evening sky. Somervell felt he was witnessing 'a sunset all over the world' and also had the illusion that they were camped in a field close to a wall that marked the limit of their capacities and endurance.”
― Peter Gillman, Wildest Dream: The Biography of George Mallory

“Mon dieu! — George Mallory! When that’s been written, what more need be said? My hand trembles, my heart palpitates, my whole being swoons away at the words — oh heavens! heavens! I found of course that he’d been absurdly maligned — he’s six foot high, with the body of an athlete by Praxiteles, and a face — ah, incredible — the mystery of Botticelli, the refinement and delicacy of a Chinese print, the youth and piquancy of an unimaginable English boy . . . . For the rest, he’s going to be a schoolmaster, and his intelligence is not remarkable. What’s the need?”
― Lytton Strachey, The Letters of Lytton Strachey