In 1970, the Messner brothers succeeded in crossing Nanga Parbat. However, in the midst of success, Reinhold experienced his greatest defeat: his brother Günther was buried under an ice avalanche. Messner returned to the "Naked Mountain" time and again; in 1978, he conquered the mountain solo via a new route and in a new style. Nowhere do triumph and tragedy coexist so closely for him. "The White Loneliness" is a story of guilt and fate, as well as the tumultuous chronicle of that mountain. In 2005, DNA analysis definitively proved that Günther Messner had perished at the foot of the Diamir face of the mountain only after their joint crossing.