Edwin Bernbaum

Edwin Bernbaum, Ph.D., is a mountaineer and scholar of comparative religion and mythology whose work focuses on the relationship between culture and nature. The first edition of Sacred Mountains of the World won the Commonwealth Club of California's gold medal for nonfiction and an Italian award for literature of mountaineering, exploration, and the environment. He is also the author of The Way to Shambhala, a study of Tibetan myths of hidden sanctuaries resembling the fictional Shangri-La of Lost Horizon. He initiated and directed a program working with National Parks such as Yosemite and Hawai'i Volcanoes to develop interpretive materials based on the evocative cultural and spiritual significance of mountain environments in cultures around the world. He is featured in “Beyond the Mountaintops: Extraordinary Mountaineers, Extraordinary People,” an exhibit at the American Mountaineering Museum on eight climbers who have pioneered advances in climbing and humankind.