On My memory of it is as clear as if it happened yesterday: Miss Meisenhammer, a kindly teacher at Welham School in Dehradun, excitedly announcing to assembled schoolboys, all aged 10 and less, that Princess Elizabeth had been crowned Queen of England-and Everest had been climbed. That was half a century ago in the first week of June, and I know which of those two events fired my imagination more. Nine years later, in a stroke of good fortune, I too found myself on Mt Everest, a member of the second Indian expedition of 1962, following in the footsteps-not to the top, alas, but close enough at the South Col-of Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay, the pair who made the first ascent on May 29, 1953.

EVEREST: SUMMIT OF ACHIEVEMENT By Stephen Venables Roli Price: Rs 1,975 Pages: 252	HIGH ADVENTURE: OUR ASCENT OF THE EVEREST By Sir Edmund Hillary Roli Price: Rs 395 Pages: 245

Hillary and Tenzing published their accounts of the ascent soon after and they quickly became classics, along with John Hunt's official account of the expedition, The Ascent of Everest. Ironically, that ascent meant the end of serious high-altitude climbing for both Tenzing and Hillary. Tenzing, who died in 1986, continued his association with the mountains, not as a climber but as an instructor. A hero in his adopted homeland, India, he was quickly inducted into the Himalayan Mountaineering Institute in Darjeeling, set up after the Everest ascent fired imagination in the newly independent India. Hillary's life went in many directions, most of them away from actual mountaineering. Over the years he has become a sort of senior statesman among mountaineers and his energy has gone into building schools and hospitals in Solo Khumbu, the region to the south of Everest which is the home of the Sherpas.

Appropriately then, this commemorative year's publishing activity includes a re-issue of Hillary's story of the climb, High Adventure. Stephen Venables, a well-known British mountaineer who was seriously hurt during a climb in Kumaon several years ago, has also edited a volume for the Royal Geographical Society, London. And there is a third, sponsored by the Mount Everest Foundation and the Alpine Club and put together by George Band who was part of the successful 1953 expedition.

Hillary's life story has been told over the years in many volumes, High Adventure being only the first. In his later years, past 80, he took another look at his life in View From The Summit, but his first book, published in 1955, has an immediacy and vividness that can only come from great adventure. Hillary was lucky to be on the expedition at all. He happened to be in Garhwal in 1951 when Nepal opened its borders to foreign climbers and the famous explorer Eric Shipton invited him and fellow New Zealander George Lowe, largely on account of their reputation and their ready availability, to join the first exploration of the southern approach to the mountain. Shipton was at first to lead the 1953 expedition, so Hillary's inclusion in the team was natural, and John Hunt, who took over the leadership in a last-minute change, invited him to join. Eventually it was Hillary's great strength and the solid team he made with Tenzing that led to their being chosen for the main summit attempt.

WELL-DESERVED REST: Band and Hillary (first and second from left) after the Everest success; (below) Hillary cuts a dashing figure

Venables' book, Everest: Summit of Achievement, is a very different sort of book. All-encompassing, it looks back at various aspects of the Everest story, the history, the Sherpas, new challenges since 1953 and the mysteries that remain. And, of course, there are the photographs and illustrations of memorabilia, which seem to me as being among the best collections to be put between one set of covers. In particular, there are several dating back to the early years, the 1920s and '30s in Tibet. There is also a wealth of contemporary photographs from different expeditions, the historic ones, such as the one taken by Reinhold Messner at the end of his solo ascent in 1980 and a spectacular view of the entire massif taken by Leo Dickinson during his epic balloon flight over the mountain in 1991.

Everest is much written about, and no single subject can withstand the sort of assault that climbers, photographers and narrators have made on it and still retain a sense of freshness. Is it possible for a subject to be over-written, to be over-published? If so, then Everest is surely a candidate for staleness. Is there anything that still remains to be addressed? Perhaps mysteries, such as what happened to George Mallory and Andrew Comyn Irvine, the two climbers who died in 1924 and were last seen on the way to the summit from their final camp, will always make interesting reading. There will be new routes, perhaps, and occasionally a writer or a photographer with a new perspective. Most of all, there remains space for a book that could answer for the lay reader the questions that have been asked of mountaineers over generations: Why climb? Why Everest? Those who have experienced it have their own private answers. But the one answer that may be common to the thousands upon thousands of climbers who endure hardship and danger for a pleasure they usually cannot express remains a mystery.