I have on several recent evenings lulled myself to sleep by reading books with titles such as “Wall of Death.”

A soothing subject.

Nothing ensures refreshing dreams quite so reliably as tales of alpinists tumbling a few thousand feet down a limestone cliff, having their skulls dashed in by boulders, or freezing to death while tethered to a rock wall by means of metal pitons and rope.

My obsession with the Eiger, a peak in the Bernese Oberland region of Switzerland, is of long standing.

The Eiger is infamous not for its height — its summit of 13,015 feet is middling by the standards of the Alps and positively puny put up against the Himalayas or Andes — but for its north face.

This concave expanse of crumbling rock is the most notorious face in the Alps, eclipsing even taller peaks such as the Matterhorn and Mont Blanc.

The first climbers to reach the Eiger’s apex did so in 1858.

But for many decades after, even daring mountaineers concluded that climbing the north face was clearly impossible, and that to try it was akin to suicide.

And so it seemed.

The first nine climbers to make serious attempts, in the 1930s, died.

In 1938 a quartet, two from Germany and two from Austria, succeeded.

Even now, almost a century later, the ascent is hardly routine. It has not become the sort of lark a person might make despite not knowing the difference between a rappel and a crampon.

(The easiest route up the Matterhorn, by contrast, comes pretty close to this definition.)

I will never climb the Eiger — by any route.

And my experience with rock-climbing is scanty, consisting of a single ascent, of the craggy peak called Three Fingered Jack north of Santiam Pass in the Cascades, a month after I graduated from high school.

But I find it endlessly fascinating to read about the brave — perhaps foolhardy — climbers who risk their fragile bodies against the cruel obstinate north face of the Eiger.

I have over the years acquired a mini-library related to that singular slope. Occasionally, for reasons I can’t pinpoint, I will pluck one of these volumes from the shelf and become entranced again by the familiar tales that seem never to go stale.

And much like climbers who venture onto the north face, once I start I am committed. I will go from one book to the next until I am satiated.

This is the ultimate ersatz experience, of course.

I experience the Eiger while comfortably ensconced on a bed or sofa.

No blizzards or ice-slickened cliffs.

Although one of the books is a hefty thing, and I sometimes come away with a sore wrist from holding it up.

— Jayson Jacoby, editor, Baker City Herald