Lost Horizon is a 1933 novel by English writer James Hilton.
This harmonizes with the existing residents of the lamasary and he is strongly attracted to life at Shangri-La..
Conway is a veteran of the trench warfare of WWI, with the emotional state frequently cited after that war--a sense of emotional exhaustion or accelerated emotional aging.
That was the real purpose of the Lamasary; study, inner peace and long life were a side benefit to living there.
It was hoped that overlooked by the violent, Shangri-la would preserve them and reveal them later to a receptive world exhausted by war.
The book explicitly notes that having made war on the ground man would now fill the skies with death, and that all precious things were in danger of being lost, like the Lost histories of Rome (Lost books of Livy).
One such town, Zhongdian, has now officially renamed itself as Shangri La (Chinese: Xianggelila) because of its claim to be the inspiration for the novel.
The remote communities he visited, such as Muli, show many similarities to the fictional Shangri-La.
It is said to have been inspired at least in part by accounts of travels in Tibetan borderlands, published in the National Geographic by the explorer and botanist Joseph Rock.
Among the book\'s themes is an allusion to the possibility of another cataclysmic world war brewing, as indeed it was at the time.
Hugh Conway, a veteran member of the British diplomatic service, finds inner peace, love, and a sense of purpose in Shangri-La, whose inhabitants enjoy unheard-of longevity.
It is best remembered as the origin of Shangri-La, a fictional utopian lamasery high in the mountains of Tibet.
Lost Horizon is a 1933 novel by English writer James Hilton
