Trespassers on the Roof of the World - The Race to Lhasa - Peter Hopkirk

A few days ago I reviewed "The Great Game" by Peter Hopkirk also. I had borrowed that book and found that he mentioned this one [Trespassers on the Roof of the World] in that one [The Great Game]. I found the Great Game such a good book I also managed to borrow this one.

This book is not as long as the Great Game, but covers a shorter time period and a smaller area. It recounts the so called Race for Lhasa which took place with almost twenty foreigners from nine nationalities.

The contestants were Russian, British, American, Indian, Swedish, Dutch, Canadian, Japanese and more British. All of them were 'gate-crashers', trying to get into Lhasa by various methods, force, disguise, subterfuge, lieing, and more. Lhasa had not been seen by a foreigner and was a Forbidden City.

Most of the explorers were private expeditions, but some were government financed, one was a Missionary expedition. None of them made it to the capital except for the Japanese expedition, and the final British expedition. The Japanese explorer, Kawaguchi, made it to Lhasa, but Hopkirk does not consider him the winner of the race because he was Asiatic and had an advantage in disguise over the others, even though he was a foreigner.

The British expedition basically conquered Tibet, destroying almost three thousand Tibetans in their move to the capital. The leader of the expedition, Francis Younghusband, negotiated a treaty with Tibet and Britain which was the main aim for his forward move.

The book is very good, and just as "The Great Game", is an amazing history book that you will love reading.