“The Mountain is My World”: New Autobiography of the Great Mountaineer Gaston Rébuffat
New volume of the “Stelle alpine” series, co-published by Hoepli and the Italian Alpine Club, with the story of the adventures of one of the most important mountaineers of the golden age of the sixth degree.
BOLOGNA – Mountaineering as a school of life, extreme climbs, high altitude bivouacs, leaving refuges in the middle of the night to cross freezing glaciers, storms, reaching the summit with the inevitable handshake with your companion. These are the traces that Gaston Rébuffat, one of the most important mountaineers of the golden age of the sixth degree, together with Lionel Terray, Pierre Mazeaud and Walter Bonatti, left in his mountaineering autobiography “The mountain is my world”, the new edition of which is coming out today for the “Stelle alpine” series, co-published by Hoepli and the Italian Alpine Club.
THE ‘APPEARANCE’ OF WHITE, THE GREAT PEAKS AND THE JOB OF ALPINE GUIDE
Trained as a climber in the 1930s on the Calanques of Marseille, the young Gaston Rébuffat, after long journeys on foot between the mountains of the South of France, he comes into sight of Mont Blanc, a revealing apparition that will change his future. Thus begins an unrepeatable journey through the mountains of dreams, from Mont Blanc to the Matterhorn, from the Eiger to Annapurna, when they were still solitary and full of mystery. In addition to climbing, the pages of “The mountain is my world” tell the story of the profession of mountain guide, the relationship with his adventure companions, the great enchantment for an inhospitable, severe and for this very reason always attractive nature. “The secret and wonderful pleasure of searching for the itinerary, the satisfaction of feeling in harmony with nature, the rock, the ice; finding the right path, guessing the holds. Guessing…” This is the essence of the esprit montagne, the spirit of the mountains, which flows from the pages of the autobiography of what can be defined as one of the most capable and sensitive mountaineers of all time.
IL BOOK EVEN ON THE CAI STORE
The book is the result of the work of Françoise Rébuffat, Gaston’s wife, who, after her husband’s death in 1985, recomposed his most significant writings published over time in various books and in the daily and periodical press. The volume is enriched by the preface by journalist and writer Marco Albino Ferrari and the afterword by artistic director and journalist Antonio Massena (president of the Central Commission for Culture of the CAI), dedicated to the cinema of Rébuffat, winner of the Trento Film Festival in 1955 with Étoiles et Tempêtes. “La montagna è il mio mondo” (218 pages, dimensions 15×21 centimeters) is available in bookstores at a price of 27.90 euros. The volume will also be available for purchase on the online store of the Italian Alpine Club (store.cai.it).
WHO WAS GASTON RÉBUFFAT
Gaston Rébuffat was born in Marseille in 1921, he spent his life in Chamonix, under his great mountain, the Mont Blanc, where he opened routes that became classics and repeated extreme itineraries. Rébuffat was a much-loved mountain guide, a model to look up to for many mountaineering masters, even today. His legacy as a popularizer is vast and significant: he was a director and published numerous publications, also appreciated by the general public, such as “Stars and Storms”, “Between Earth and Sky”, “Ice, Snow and Rock”, “The Bianco Massif: The 100 Most Beautiful Ascensions”.