Mountain Culture

Maria Coffey

Thursday, November 6, Noon – 1:00 p.m.
Literary Lunch Break

Donald Cameron Hall Dining Room

Author Maria Coffey is no stranger to adventure. Alongside her husband Dag Goering, she has led a life of exploration, traveling the world by kayaks, sailing vessels, bicycles, and on foot. Through her writing, Coffey has provided a glimpse of the extraordinary moments of exhilaration and the far-reaching personal costs associated with adventure.

In her latest book, Explorers of the Infinite, Coffey investigates why extreme athletes and mountaineers take risks that allow them to push the limits of consciousness, and what they encounter there: visions, near-death experiences, and psychic communication. She reviews cutting-edge science, and consults the history of philosophy and spirituality to answer the question: could the state of intense “aliveness” that is the allure of extreme sports for so many actually be a route to a connection with the beyond?

Coffey’s Where the Mountain Casts Its Shadow: The Dark Side of Extreme Adventure won Best Book – Mountain Literature at the 2003 Banff Mountain Book Festival.