Stephen Venables

Stephen Venables was the first Briton to climb Everest without supplementary oxygen, climbing a new route up the immense Kangshung Face – just one of his many first ascents around the world. Despite having made a name on Everest and climbed the famous North Face of the Eiger, he is happiest on obscure, unknown – preferably unclimbed – mountains. He says the bravest thing he ever did was to send an unsolicited book proposal to Hodder & Stoughton in 1985. A year later 'Painted Mountains' won the Boardman Tasker prize and since then he has published another eleven books, two of which won prizes at the Banff Mountain Festival. One of his best trips ever was skiing the alpine Haute Route with his then sixteen year old son Edmond. His other son died young of a brain tumour and was the subject of his Sunday Times bestseller 'Ollie'. Stephen currently lives in Edinburgh with his wife Rosie. After years of long drives from the south of England, he is happy now to have the Scottish Highlands on his doorstep. Having still not found a proper job, he continues to earn a living from writing, lecturing and leading yacht-based mountaineering trips to the island of South Georgia and the Antarctic Peninsula.