Into Thin Air Themes

A simple question hangs over Into Thin Air: why would people travel to the other side of the world and pay lavish sums of money to risk their own lives on the slopes of Mount Everest? In general, why would anyone climb mountains for fun, when the mortality rate for mountaineers is alarmingly high? As Jon Krakauer shows, mountaineers enjoy climbing Everest not in spite of the danger, but because of it. The…

Another important theme of Into Thin Air is the natural world. Climbers choose to ascend mountains, not just because of the inherent danger of doing so (see above), but also because of the mountains’ sublime beauty and majesty—qualities that civilization cannot rival. The characters in the book believe that they can use their training, technology, and intelligence to “conquer” Everest. However, the 1996 Everest disaster provides them an unforgettable reminder of nature’s awesome power—power that…

In the forty-odd years since Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first human beings to climb to the summit of Mount Everest, the sport of mountaineering has experienced some major changes. Climbing Mount Everest has largely become a group activity, where before it was usually a challenge for a single, determined climber, or, at most, two climbers with a close bond of friendship and talent. While Krakauer spends many pages dissecting why…

In the final chapters of Into Thin Air, it becomes clear that guilt is one of the key themes of the book. On the afternoon of May 10, 1996, Jon Krakauer makes it back to his tent, having climbed to the summit of Mount Everest; exhausted, he falls into a deep sleep. Unbeknownst to Krakauer at the time, however, many of his teammates get caught in the middle of a deadly snowstorm. One…