Perspective

This story is principally told in the first person from Reinhold Messner's point of view, although other viewpoints enter in several ways. The most significant variation on Messner's first person is the regular interruption of the text with excerpts from Nena Holquin's diary. Also in first person, these entries provide interesting breaks from Messner's ideas and emotions because Holquin's thoughts are frequently much different than those of Messner concerning the same events. Indeed, it seems that Messner includes these diary entries for just that reason, even though Nena's opinions sometimes make Messner look mean and selfish. Journalistic-style segments that describe topography, weather, or political issues provide other interruptions of Messner's narrative. These segments are sometimes separated in boxes and sometimes are integrated into the main text. One other deviation for Messner's first-person perspective occurs at the end of the book, when the translators add a third-person account of...