84 pages 2 hours read

Jon Krakauer

Into Thin Air: A Personal Account of the Mount Everest Disaster

Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1997

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.

Reading Context

Use these questions or activities to help gauge students’ familiarity with and spark their interest in the context of the work, giving them an entry point into the text itself.

Short Answer

1. Why might some people be drawn to risky or potentially dangerous activities in nature? What kinds of activities might fall into this description?

Teaching Suggestion: If students are having difficulty thinking of potentially dangerous activities in nature, it might be helpful to discuss extreme sports, such as skydiving, scuba diving, mountain biking, or snowboarding.

2. In Into Thin Air, Jon Krakauer chronicles his bid to reach the top of Mount Everest, the highest mountain in the world. This adventure demanded ambition and sacrifice. What drives Human Ambition? What is the tradeoff between ambition and sacrifice? Can a person be too ambitious?

Teaching Suggestion: Students might benefit from engaging in a more structured debate about whether a person can be too ambitious.

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