Analysis Of Chris Mccandlessness In Into The Wild

In the wilderness of Alaska, temperatures can drop down to thirty degrees below zero. Christopher McCandless lived in these conditions for four months after traveling through North America for almost two years. It can be seen in the novel, Into the Wild, that during his journey he had many brushes with death and burned bridges with people who deeply cared for him. For those reasons and many more, people assert Chris McCandless was unprepared, careless, and selfish on his personal journey across the United States, culminating in his death in Alaska.

In Jon Krakauer's novel Into the Wild, the main character, Chris McCandless, seeks nature so that he can find a sense of belonging and the true meaning of who he is. However, it is the essence of nature that eventually takes his life away from him. At the end of his life, he is discovers his purpose and need of other people. After Chris McCandless death in Alaska, Krakauer wrote Into the Wild to reflect on the journey that McCandless makes. Krakauer protrays McCandless as a young man who is reckless, selfish, and arrogant, but at the same time, intelligent, determined, independent, and charismatic. Along with the irony that occurs in nature, these characteristics are the several factors that contribute to McCandless death.

Chris McCandless was a true adventurer. He went to his journeys mostly by foot and would not take any chance to cheat it. He bought an aluminum canoe at Arizona and paddled down the Colorado River, and nearly drowning in rough water in the Gulf of California. In his journal, he writes ."..It is the experiences, the memories, the great triumphant joy of living to the fullest extent in which real meaning is found. God it's great to be alive! Thank you. Thank you" (pg37). His confession in his journal proved that he had no regrets of what he had done even though it almost cost him his life. He also turned down Wayne's offer to buy him an airplane ticket to

In the novel Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer, Chris McCandless takes a wild journey. Although some believe that his journey and thought process was noble and courageous, he was actually extremely fatuous throughout his journey. Many people that Chris met along the way made remarkable attempts at making him aware of the dangers that he would surely face in Alaska. Chris McCandless knowingly stepped into the treacherous wild without being prepared for what reality would throw his way.

Jon Krakauer, the author of the book, Into the Wild only know about Chris McCandless is an explorer traveling to Alaska search for himself reborn. However he isn’t exactly what he really is, but an ignorant, foolish, selfish, and misunderstanding of the world in which he lives. These words that have been used to describe him are based on the idea that he went on a journey to the Alaskan wilderness to seek his own revelation, but not having a firm grasp of reality, he senselessly died a stubborn man, the people mention that he was unprepared to go into the wilderness, didn’t listen to a more experienced person, broken several of state laws, abandoned his family and loved ones, and followed a dream that never existed. Personally believed he is an ignorant fool, selfish, and misunderstand man that throws his life away for nothing but despair.

Christopher Johnson McCandless is a respectable man in so many ways but, yet such a foolish man in many others. Chris McCandless possessed a seemingly ever-lasting bravery that constantly shined through his unique and matchless character. He was very righteous in himself to the point in which he kept himself from any sin or evil, committing his life to what seemed like an idea of celibacy, not just in refraining from any desire of flesh but also in all lusts of life with his diligent power of will that constantly shined through his exterior. Onto the contrary of his good characteristics, McCandless remained to be very foolish in his decisions and under takings, whether it be by his arrogance of sheer narrow mindedness.

The plot line of a tragic story is one that enthralls a reader with the rise and fall of a tragic hero. After the death of Christopher McCandless in Alaska over 20 years ago, not only is there still discussion of what was the true cause of his death, but also the widespread debate of a much larger question: was McCandless a tragic hero? Some argue that Christopher McCandless is a selfish coward and ended up giving his whole life and education away due to his lack of knowledge of the wilderness, while others argue that he lived his life through pushing beyond the limits of a normal human being and seeking what is limited to most of society. In the novel Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer describes the travels of McCandless and writes about how past

He underestimates the terrain and climate, and, “…came into the country with insufficient provisions, and he lacked certain pieces of equipment deemed essential by many Alaskans…” (180 Krakauer). Chris lacked the necessities, so it made his survival rate drop. Information is key in the wilderness, which, “not only did McCandless die because he was stupid, one Alaskan correspondent observed, but ‘the scope of his self-styled adventure was so small as to a ring pathetic-squatting in a wrecked bus a few miles out of Healy, potting jays and squirrels, mistaking a caribou for a moose (pretty hard to do)…only one word for the guy: incompetent’” (177 Krakauer). Chris lacked the knowledge needed to survive the Alaskan frontier, which dropped his survival rate.

In these instances it is by luck alone that Chris does not end up suffering an even earlier death. The most obvious example of Chris’ naivety is why he even began his journey in the first place. He had read many books by Jack London, but “he seemed to forget they were works of fiction”(44). These fictitious tales of the “beautiful, white North” gave him false ideas of what the Alaska really was, and how dangerous it could really be. He lacked the common sense to realize that these books weren’t really an accurate depiction of what his journey would actually be like. Throughout the entire book, Chris also shows an inability to prepare for his expeditions. Most prominent of these instances is Chris’ failure to bring the appropriate supplies for his trip through the stampede trail. “He wasn’t carrying anywhere near as much food and gear as you’d expect”(4). Chris’ naive dream to live on next to nothing in the wild is simply idiotic. Not only did he pack far too little to survive, but he refused to accept Gallien’s expert advice or even an offer of better supplies. Even an experienced hunter such as Gallien couldn’t imagine living in the wild with as little as Chris brought, so how could Chris, an inexperienced kid from California, be expected to survive with only 10

This forced him to hunt animals and gather berries and other edible plants for him to eat. In another article, by Craig Medred, he addresses Chris’s mental state, “ “Personal identity is frequently disturbed in schizophrenia. Early symptoms include the feeling that one is different or altered in some as yet indefinable way,” they write. “In other cases, patients may believe that they are someone else, either known or unknown, famous or infamous.” Many people have probably written about themselves in the third person at some time, as Supertramp did in his journals. But how many of them flip back and forth between competing identities?” Medred believes that Chris had schizophrenia, which is what caused him to create the pseudonym, “Alex Supertramp.” If Chris did have schizophrenia, like Medred thinks, then it creates a reasonable explanation as to why Chris left behind a good life to travel the United States. Not only does this make sense as to why Alex is brought into play, it could have made Chris believe that Alex had the skills to survive in the wild. And make Chris think that he could survive using the small amount of materials that he had brought with him. On July 20th, Judith Kleinfeld wrote a paper talking about Chris, the paper is called “McCandless: Hero or dumb jerk?” In the paper, she addresses the novel, “Jon Krakauer's best seller "Into the Wild" immortalizes this young man, who walked into the wilderness with no

If you attempted to talk him out of something, he wouldn’t argue. He would just nod politely and then do exactly what he wanted” (Krakauer 182). Chris did exactly as Carine stated he would when someone tried to stop his trip to Alaska. Chris understood what the trip to Alaska would entail but decided to continue anyway. He was confident in his abilities and constantly felt the need to challenge those abilities. According to Jon Krakauer, “He had a need to test himself in ways, as he was fond of saying ‘that mattered’. He possessed grand- some would say grandiose- spiritual ambitions” (Krakauer 182). Although Chris’s ambition is surely admirable it also could be credited as his tragic flaw. Chris strived for perfection in everything he set his mind to. He refused to listen to individuals who were trying to help him when saying he was ill prepared; instead he ignored their efforts and went into the wild. Chris’s unpreparedness could later be identified as the cause of his death but in his mind, his supporters would like to believe, it did not matter. Chris died doing what he loved, living in isolation with nature being his only companion.

Into the Wild, written by John Krakauer tells of a young man named Chris McCandless who 1deserted his college degree and all his worldly possessions in favor of a primitive transient life in the wilderness. Krakauer first told the story of Chris in an article in Outside Magazine, but went on to write a thorough book, which encompasses his life in the hopes to explain what caused him to venture off alone into the wild. McCandless’ story soon became a national phenomenon, and had many people questioning why a “young man from a well-to-do East Coast family [would] hitchhike to Alaska” (Krakauer i). Chris comes from an affluent household and has parents that strived to create a desirable life for him and his sister. As Chris grows up, he

Chris knew some things about living in the wild but not enough. Since Chris was book

     Chris McCandless to me was a very intelligent but stubborn man. He didn’t care about how his family felt. All along his quest to the stampede trail Chris was kind to strangers and others but neglected the fact that his family back home worried about him. In the end Chris became at one with nature but realized that his surroundings (meaning family

Into the Wild, a book by Jon Krakauer, tells the story of Christopher McCandless. McCandless was a young man who felt the need to live an unorthodox life by living off the land. McCandless developed ideas about philosophy from Jack London. His education is greatly respected, although his perception of the meaning of life and his ideas about how to find true happiness are misunderstood without problem. McCandless felt that the only way for him to be happy was to venture into the Alaskan wilderness with nothing more than a bag of rice and a measly backpack. A man named Shaun Callarman stated that he did not think Chris’s venture was honorable at all. It was Chris’s poor preparation and big mistakes that costed Chris his life and Callarman thinks