Mount Everest
nounUK /ˌmaʊnt ˈɛv(ə)ɹɪst/ · US /ˌmaʊnt ˈɛv(ə)ɹəst/
Etymology From mount + Everest, coined by the British army officer and Surveyor General of India Andrew Scott Waugh (1810–1878)—originally as Mont Everest—in a paper of 1 March 1856 to the Royal Geographical Society, after his predecessor George Everest (1790–1866): see the quotation. The name Mount Everest was used in a paper on 27 October 1856 by the British naturalist Brian Houghton Hodgson (1800 or 1801 – 1894) and by Sir Roderick Impey Murchison (1792–1871), the President of the Society, at a meeting of the Society on 11 May 1857 at which the two papers were read.
Figuratively An endeavor that is very demanding yet rewarding; also, something which is the highest achievement, challenge, etc.; the epitome, the pinnacle, the ultimate.
- We stand on the colossal peak of King Lear, with Othello on our right hand and Macbeth on our left, the sublime masses of Elizabethan mountain country rolling on every side of us, yet plainly dominated by the extraordinary central cluster of aiguilles on which we have planted ourselves. This triple summit of the later tragedies of [William] Shakespeare forms the Mount Everest of the poetry of the world.1907, Edmund Gosse, “The Age of Elizabeth 1560–1610”, in A Short History of Modern English Literature, London: William Heinemann, →OCLC, page 104:
- After this rather tricky problem let's climb the Mount Everest of all writing problems. I mean, of course, the world-famous, forbidding peak of U.S. income-tax prose.1958, Rudolf Flesch, “How to Write Like a Pro”, in A New Way to Better English, Garden City, N.Y.: Dolphin Books, Doubleday & Company, →OCLC, page 102:
4 more examples
- Personally, as a coach, I always considered the NCAA Tournament to be the Mount Everest of basketball. Just to be asked to climb it was a compliment.1983, Al McGuire, “Foreword”, in They Were Number One: A History of the NCAA Basketball Tournament, New York, N.Y.: Leisure Press, →ISBN, page 13:
- War and Peace is often seen as the Mount Everest of novels. A daunting door-stopper of a tome, at almost 1,500 pages, it is rarely finished.2010 January 17, Claire Sawers, “A journey from ballroom to battlefield”, in The Times, London: News UK, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 09 Jul 2021:
- I lost seven kilos in the heat, but I needed to do it. I had to put myself through the wall to get where I needed to be. This was my Mount Everest. I had to climb it to prove to myself that I could compete at this level. But by gee, it was bloody hard work.2011, Max Davidson, quoting Dean Jones, “Dean Jones: ‘Get Me a Real Australian’”, in Fields of Courage: The Bravest Chapters in Sport, London: Abacus, Little, Brown Book Group, published 2012, →ISBN, page 95:
- Most great book lists concentrate on works of the highest literary or scholarly merit. Think of the Harvard Classics, Harold Bloom's "Western Canon," the Modern Library's selection of "the 100 best novels of the 20th century." Here, the compilers imply, are our cultural masterpieces, the Mount Everests and K2s all literate people should scale in their lifetime.2012 June 21, Michael Dirda, “Library of Congress issues list of ‘Books that Shaped America’”, in The Washington Post (Style section), Washington, D.C.: The Washington Post Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 06 Jun 2014: