Explores Ruth Mallory's pioneering spirit in climbing and its reflection on evolving attitudes towards risk, intertwined with historical research and discovery

Behind Everest embarks on a captivating exploration that intertwines the remarkable life of Ruth Mallory, wife of legendary Everest climber George Mallory, with a parallel journey a century later. Through examining Ruth’s attitude to danger a century ago, Kate Nicholson explores our evolving attitudes towards risk and responsibility.

Kate’s quest to understand Ruth takes her to forgotten corners of archives in the UK and USA, to conversations with the few remaining people who knew both George and Ruth and into private recollections and precious, private collections. Using two decades of research, the author unveils the real story behind Ruth and George Mallory’s marriage, shedding light on George’s relationships with women such as Jelly d’Aranyi, Mary Ann O’Malley, and Stella Cobden-Sanderson. Stella, like Ruth, hailed from Arts and Crafts ‘royalty,’ both women were daughters of strong feminists but only Ruth chose to climb.

Ruth was a natural and accomplished climber, a founder member of the first all female rock climbing club in the UK, the Pinnacle Club. As Kate experiences the challenges and triumphs of rock climbing with that still thriving club, she discovers not only the elusive ‘key’ to George Mallory but also an inspiring and resilient companion in Ruth.

This book goes beyond expeditions to Everest, offering readers a profound glimpse into the ‘real’ story of the Mallorys. Through Ruth’s lens, the book explores the complexities of marriage, the indomitable spirit of early female climbers, and the enduring impact of the First World War, the League of Nations and the Empire on individual lives. This is a non-fiction masterpiece that intertwines personal and historical narratives, inviting readers to scale the heights of human experience.

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• From Everest’s Historians
• Acknowledgements
• Foreword
• Preface
• Magdalene Centenary Project
• Notes on Sources
• Introduction ‘… pushed her forcibly over the edge!’
• Part I: Before Everest
  • Chapter One Falling
  • Chapter Two ‘Twice Born’
  • Chapter Three Engagement ‘with a little danger in it’
  • Chapter Four Honeymooning and ‘….’
  • Chapter Five Threading the Needle
  • Chapter Six Childbirth and Vicarious Danger
  • Chapter Seven War
  • Chapter Eight Children
  • Chapter Nine Prejudice and ‘Personal Ambitions’
  • Chapter Ten Survivors’ Meet
  • Chapter Eleven Bouldering and Bloomsbury
  • Chapter Twelve Pinnacle Club
• Part II: Everest
  • Chapter Thirteen ‘Pye has got it all wrong’
  • Chapter Fourteen The Right Kind of Wife
  • Chapter Fifteen Jealousy and ‘Dangerous’ Love
  • Chapter Sixteen The Heroics of Ordinary Life
  • Chapter Seventeen Luxury and British Empire Politics
  • Chapter Eighteen Priorities and Prejudice
  • Chapter Nineteen Death on the Mountain
  • Chapter Twenty Collateral Damage and Hope
  • Chapter Twenty-One Ruth, Kathleen, Pat and Stella
• Part III: 1924
  • Chapter Twenty-Two ‘Self ?’
  • Chapter Twenty-Three The Last Goodbye
  • Chapter Twenty-Four ‘… you poor left behind one’
  • Chapter Twenty-Five The Last Post and Everest
  • Chapter Twenty-Six ‘If my soul could hold the hand of your soul’
• Part IV After Everest
  • Chapter Twenty-Seven ‘What if ’
  • Chapter Twenty-Eight ‘To turn back a third time, or to die?’
  • Chapter Twenty-Nine ‘The Zennor Affair’
  • Chapter Thirty ‘All Letters’
  • Chapter Thirty-One Film Premiere
• Part V: Life After George
  • Chapter Thirty-Two A Body and an Ice Axe
  • Chapter Thirty-Three Remarriage
  • Chapter Thirty-Four 1 June 1942
• Appendix I: Ruth’s Letter, 3–5 March 1924
• Appendix II: Extract from Interview with Dorothea Pilley
• Appendix III: Ruth’s Remains and her Estate
• Appendix IV: League of Nations
• Appendix V: Abbreviations
• Bibliography
• Plates