Mountaineers have often observed a lack of clarity in their mental state at high altitudes; it is difficult for the stupid mind to observe how stupid….

What we get from this adventure is just sheer joy. And joy is, after all, the end of life. We do not live to eat and make money..

Because it is there [famous explanation for wanting to climb Mount Everest]..

The highest of the world's mountains, it seems, has to make but a single gesture of magnificence to be the lord of all, vast in unchallenged and isol….

Why do we travel to remote locations? To prove our adventurous spirit or to tell stories about incredible things? We do it to be alone amongst friend….

We don't live to eat and make money. We eat and make money to be able to enjoy life. That is what life means, and that is what life is for..

To struggle and to understand. Never the last without the first. That is the law..

- Why do you want to climb Mt. Everest, Sir? - Because it is there..

Why climb Mount Everest? Because it's there..

One must conquer, achieve, get to the top; one must know the end to be convinced that one can win the end - to know there's no dream that mustn't be ….

So, if you cannot understand that there is something in man which responds to the challenge of this mountain and goes out to meet it, that the strugg….

How to get the best of it all? One must conquer, achieve, get to the top; one must know the end to be convinced that one can win the end - to know th….

I look back on tremendous efforts & exhaustion & dismal looking out of a tent door on to a dismal world of snow and vanishing hopes - & yet, & yet, &….

For the stone from the top for geologists, the knowledge of the limits of endurance for the doctors, but above all for the spirit of adventure to kee….

Half the charm of climbing mountains is born in visions preceding this experience - visions of what is mysterious, remote, inaccessible..

My mind is in a state of constant rebellion. I believe that will always be so..

The greatest danger in life is not to take the adventure..

Just to lie here in the sun with great white peaks all around me and the biggest glacier in Europe at my feet, to eat from time to time, to sleep a l….

The first question which you will ask and which I must try to answer is this; What is the use of climbing Mount Everest? and my answer must at once b….

One comes to bless the absolute bareness, feeling that here is a pure beauty of form, a kind of ultimate harmony..

Because it's there. (when asked why he wanted to climb Everest).