The author and protagonist of Touching the Void, Joe Simpson is a motivational speaker and an author of both fiction and nonfiction adventure literature. His first-person account of his near-death experience in the Andes at the age of 25 forms the foundation of Touching the Void. Simpson’s ability to vividly recount his ordeal’s psychological and physical challenges provides profound insights into endurance and the will to live, thematically illustrating The Psychology of Survival. Following the events recounted in this novel, Simpson underwent six surgeries on his leg and a lengthy recovery. Illustrating his resilience, he disproved doctors’ predictions that he would struggle walking and never climb again. After his rehabilitation, Simpson continued mountaineering and unsuccessfully attempted to summit the North Face of the Eiger six times. In 1991, he broke his left ankle while climbing the Nepalese mountain Mal Duff and finally retired from mountaineering in 2009.

Subsequent to Touching the Void, Simpson authored several other nonfiction books that recount expeditions and reveal the author’s changing attitude toward mountaineering in extreme conditions. In This Game of Ghosts (1993), he reflects on friends who have died while engaged in the “game” of attempting dangerous climbing routes.