FALL OF THE PHANTOM LORD

FALL OF THE PHANTOM LORD
By Andrew Todhunter
Anchor Books, 1998
ISBN 0-385-48641-3

Review by George R. Pasley

The title “Phantom Lord” is a name given by climbers, jumpers and various sorts of extreme sports enthusiasts to the fear of death. Todhunter’s book chronicles a series of visits the author had with Dan Osman, known for the dangerous sports of “free-soloing” (rock climbing without ropes or other safety gear); and "rope jumping" (controlled free-falling) (falling several hundred feet from a cliff then being caught by a safety rope), for which his record was over 1000 feet. Osman died in 1998, shortly after publication of the book, from a fall in Yosemite National Park.

Death of the Phantom Lord occurs when a rope-jumper stands on the edge, confronts his or her fear of death, and leaps. In leaping, fear of death dies, hence, “fall of the Phantom Lord.”

Todhunter intersperses accounts of his visits with Osman with memories of his own risk-taking (Todhunter is a diving instructor and a sailor). The book does not seem to encourage risk-taking, but is instead a guide through the conflict occurring in the author as he wrestles with putting his risk-taking youth behind him in order to take on the responsibilities of marriage and fatherhood.

Todhunter is something of a climber too, and well versed in the techniques of climbing and mountaineering. That knowledge adds depth to the story as he is able to give detailed descriptions of the climbs and jumps that he observed, and of his own attempts to follow Osman on some of the rock-climbing and ice-climbing adventures. Not being a climber myself I did not understand much of the technical descriptions but they did not overwhelm the story.

Talking about people who don’t face fear the way he does, Osman says “I strongly admire that quality in people, those people who are secure in themselves enough to say, ‘You’re not getting me out there. I’m fine right here.’” (p. 130). Another climber is described as being well respected because he was not afraid to back down the mountain if conditions were not safe.

As Todhunter makes an assortment of visits to Osman, his wife becomes pregnant and gives birth. Todhunter describes the birth, a difficult one in which at one point the baby’s life was in jeopardy and after which the mother’s life was briefly in jeopardy. That experience was numbing to Todhunter so that he didn’t really understand the depth of his fear until hours later, after mother and child were both safe. His best writing describes that experience:

“I have never been hit by an avalanche but in the hospital bed I am struck so fast and hard by such a fear that it feels as if I am going to disintegrate, to rip apart. I clutch the sheet with my hands. Erin is bleeding and I can’t stop it. The blood is running from her. I am drowning. The ceiling is upon my chest and crushing me. My bones are snapping. I am choking, gasping for air.

“I throw myself to the floor, kneel on the tiles, and lean into the seat of the chair. I crush my hands together and grind my forehead, brutally against my clasped hands, I cannot escape. My wife and child are dying and I cannot help.

“The walls stop shaking, suddenly. The roaring is extinguished.

“There is someone else in the room. I can feel the distinct presence of Erin and Julia, alive behind me, as clearly as I can feel my two hands, clasped the one within the other. But there is another, near the foot of the bed behind me, closer to the ceiling than the floor. I do not look. I know exactly where he is… (pp. 163, 164)”

Todhunter does not use the name, but in being overcome by fear, he has met the real Lord.

At the book’s conclusion Todhunter decided he will not join Osman on a high jump from a bridge. He describes that decision as “feeling like loss”, but he realizes he will never face another fear as great as that which he experienced after the birth of his daughter. He writes:

“Throughout a youth spent largely in pursuit of fear, I never for a moment suspected where I would find its source. We all draw lines, spontaneously or after long reflection, and every one that matters is a kind of death. And yet each line is an offering, less a bar of closure than a circle, inscribed to shelter something we love more (p. 209).”

I found this to be a profound book, a book that should be appealing to risk-takers and thinkers of many types.

August 22, 2008