The Heart of the World FROM THE PUBLISHER
"The legend of Shangri-La emerged from the Tibetan Buddhist belief in beyul, or hiddenlands. According to Tibetan tradition, the more remote and inaccessible the beyul, the more illuminating the paradise it conceals. Ancient Tibetan prophecies proclaim that the greatest of these mystical sanctuaries lies at the eastern edge of the Himalayas, veiled by a colossal waterfall at the heart of the forbidding Tsangpo gorge, the earth's deepest and most impenetrable chasm. For generations, Tibetan pilgrims and Western explorers alike sought a route into the depths of the gorge in quest of this mythic waterfall. In 1924, after the last ill-fated British expedition, the Royal Geographical Society declared the legendary Falls of the Tsangpo to be nothing more than a "religious myth" and a "romance of geography."" The heart of the Tsangpo gorge remained a blank spot on the map of world exploration until world-class climber and Buddhist scholar Ian Baker set out more than twenty years ago to learn the truth behind the ancient Tibetan Buddhist legends. After years of interviewing lamas, deciphering cryptic Tantric texts, and making pilgrimages to the gorge, on the last of a series of harrowing expeditions, Baker and his National Geographic-sponsored team made worldwide news by reaching the bottom of the gorge and finding a magnificent 108-foot-high waterfall, the legendary grail of both Western explorers and Tibetan seekers.
FROM THE CRITICS
Publishers Weekly
A heady melange of history, wilderness exploration and Tibetan Buddhism study, this true story of the search for the "hidden-lands" of Pemako, Tibet, is scholarly, entertaining and transcendent. Baker first heard of this place "where the physical and spiritual worlds overlap" in 1977, while living in Kathmandu, and spent much of the next 22 years obsessively exploring it, as both an adventurer and a Buddhist pilgrim. As far back as 1377, Tibetan lamas were led by dreams and visions to secret texts hidden in Pemako's caves and behind its waterfalls: the manuscripts supposedly described physical and spiritual landscapes leading to an Eden-like earthly paradise. Baker chronicles British imperialist explorations of this area as well as Tibetan lamas' pilgrimages there. Local deities called Suma protected Pemako from "those whose intentions are not in harmony with [its] spirit" (including the latest "liberation" by the Chinese), until 1998, when Chinese scientists penetrated its deepest wilderness and began planning to destroy it with a hydroelectric dam. Interspersing the account with tales of Tibetan rimpoches (monastic lamas) and British botanists, Baker describes three of his trips to Pemako: to a gorge (perhaps the world's deepest), a sacred mountain and, finally, an elusive, mythic waterfall. His success is intimately tied to his deepening understanding of Buddhist philosophy and Tibetan culture. Heartbreakingly, his sportsman's ambition collides with his appreciation of the mystery when his "discovery" of the last hidden place threatens it with the onslaught of civilization. Photos. Agent, Owen Laster. (Nov.) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
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