India, March 12 -- "The mountains would become in my life the symbol - and solution - of this conflict between the spirit and the senses, making straight the way to an understanding of purpose in life's stumblings," wrote Bill Aitken in The Nanda Devi Affair. Published 32 years ago this month, the book cemented the Scotsman's reputation as a travel writer who respected local traditions even as he highlighted concerns facing local populations. Aitken, who hitchhiked to India in 1959 as part of his fieldwork for a course in comparative religion, believed in Nature. It is what kept him going until he breathed his last, aged 90, in April last year.

In The Nanda Devi Affair, he writes, "What Birmingham had done to stimulate my love for Dumyat...