Analysis of Jon Krakauer’s Into The Wild Essay example

In the author's notes he put “Through most of the book, I have tried--and largely succeeded, I think to--to minimize my authorial presence. But let the reader be warned: I interrupt McCandless’s story with fragments of a narrative drawn from my own youth. I do so in the hope that my experiences will throw some oblique light on the enigma of Chris McCandless”(Krakauer 2). By telling us that he will add some stories of his own make us realize that Krakauer has some relation with McCandless and it make us think that this book is more believable. In the book when he tells us that Chris just died for a simple mistake and tries to relate it to himself by telling the story of how he started to realized that going into the wilderness will change his life he emphasizes“I would go to Alaska, ski inland from the sea across thirty miles of glacial ice, and ascend this mighty nordwand. I decide, moreover, to do it alone. ” Just like McCandless, Krakauer had a lot in common with him, they both went into the wild of Alaska, which gives a lot of experience to krakauer to talk about McCandless death. In order for Krakauer to make McCandless not a crazy kid he made some other similarities between McCandless and some other people that died, with a lot of characteristics similar to McCandless and himself. Krakauer is the ideal person to criticate

Towards the middle of chapter two, Krakauer incorporates a vivid sense of imagery when describing the dead body of Chris McCandless. He describes in detail how, “The remains were so badly decomposed that it was impossible to determine exactly when McCandless had died, but the coroner could find no sign of massive internal injuries or broken bones. Virtually no subcutaneous fat remained on the body, and the muscles had withered significantly in the days or weeks prior to death” (Pages 13-14 Krakauer). This usage of imagery helps convey the significant decay in McCandless’ body, and the true sense of fear of the people. Through this description, Krakauer is able

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 just a victim of his own obsession. The novel "Into The Wild" written by John Krakauer revealed the life of a young bright man named Chris McCandless who turned up dead in Alaska in summer 1992. In the novel, John Krakauer approached carefully McCandless's life without putting too much authorial judgment to the readers. Although Chris McCandless remained an elusive figure throughout the novel, I can see Chris McCandless as a dreamy young idealist who tries to follow his dream but failed because of his innocent mistake which prove to be fatal and irreversible. Still, Chris McCandless's courage and passion was something that we should all be proud of.

Through this technique, Krakauer helps to develop Chris’s personality and t conveys the author’s purpose of tell McCandless’s story.

As soon as I picked this book up, I could not put it down. Every chance I got, I was reading. I was begging in class for you to let us have down time so I could submerge myself into this virtual reality that I wanted to experience. Unfortunately at the end of this memoir, Chris McCandless dies of what Krakauer believes to be starvation. The cool thing about how Krakauer revised this novel is how he relates it to all teenagers. At one point in time mostly all teenagers have a fight with their parents and they feel as if running away from it all is their only escape. He focuses on Chirs McCandless’ life so much to create the theme that no matter how much you fight and argue, your parents love you and they want the best for you no matter what.

Throughout the novel, Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer sincerely disentangles the haunting enigma of Chris McCandless. By tracing the places, people and experiences intertwined in the life of McCandless, Krakauer narrates the life story of a puzzling corpse found in a bus buried in the Alaskan frontier in a truly authentic way of storytelling. Although Krakauer inserts direct quotes from people who McCandless came into direct contact with and experts from primary source journals, Krakauer’s own voice in the narration of the dead man’s life is trustworthy due to the similarities the protagonist and the author share. Common connections such as similar paternal stress made outstanding impacts in both men’s lives, starting at a young age. Furthermore, a sort of agitation with the soul ailed Krakauer and McCandless fueled by a reckless persona confined in the modern world. Lastly, a craving for human contact when in total isolation troubled both the author and subject in their adventures narrowed in the natural world. The mutual bond apparent to the reader between Krakauer and McCandless makes the writing in the novel sincere enabling Krakauer to speak of a dead’s man life with profound authority and truth. Unconditional understanding through shared paternal issues, agitation of the soul, and need for human contact grants Krakauer access to divulge into the conundrum of Chis McCandless and authority to earnestly narrate the mysterious

“As a youth, [Krakauer was] told, [he] was willful, self-absorbed, intermittently reckless, moody. [He] disappointed [his] father…. Like McCandless, figures of male authority aroused in [him]…confusing medley of corked fury and hunger to please. If something captured [his] undisciplined imagination, [he] pursued it with a zeal bordering on obsession, and from the age of seventeen until [his] late twenties that something was mountain climbing” (134).

Krakauer uses research about the life of McCandless in order to establish his ethos and convey his thesis of the novel. When Krakauer presents the information concerning McCandless’s death, he quotes directly from the moose hunters who found him dead and describes the exact setting of the situation. Krakauer beings by explaining the scene at which the moose hunters found him, “A few hundred yards beyond the river the trail disappeared” (Krakauer 12). Krakaurer’s use of description enables readers to visualize the scene better and create a major sense of trust between the author and reader. Krakauer then imbeds a quote directly from the moose hunters that found McCandless’s body who explains that there was “a real bad smell from inside” (Krakauer12). Appealing to the reader’s sense of smell, and also using the perspective of the exact people that found McCandless’s body, establishes a more ethical appeal to the audiences trust in the information the author is presenting. Also, Krakauer cites an exact note found on the bus where McCandless was discovered which states that he is “Near death” (Krakauer 12). The note displayed in the text is written in a different font, implying that the proceeding text is written by a different author, and is also signed by McCandless himself. The research Krakauer did is directly shown here because of his factual evidence. The use of factual information from the scene of the death provides a

5. Chapters 14 and 15 describe Krakauer’s successful attempt when he was 23 years old to climb the “Devil’s Thumb,” a mountain in Alaska. He also describes what he thinks are parallels between McCandless and himself. Do these chapters increase his credibility for writing this book, or do they undermine his credibility by making it seem like he has his own agenda and is not objective?

Krakauer wrote this book to show people that Chris McCandless was similar to everyone and that we should respect what people think, Krakauer argues “My suspicion that McCandless's death was unplanned, that it was a terrible accident, comes from reading those few documents he left behind and from listening to the men and women who spent time with him over the final year of his life” (Krakauer 134).Krakauer is trying to persuade people into thinking that McCandless was actually like any regular kid and he tries to tell this to the people that thought that McCandless was a stubborn kid. While Krakauer was writing the book he put a counter argument against the Alaskans and clarified why it's not true. After Krakauer wrote the article and published it, he got negative comments, some of them argued“Alex is a nut in my book” … why would any son cause his parents and

The book “Into the Wild” by Jon Krakauer is a story about a man by the name of Chris McCandless. He is a man who grew up in a DC suburb, graduated college and decides to change the ways of his life. He journeys across the country, and finds his way to Alaska. His means are to leave the material lifestyle and become at one with nature. During Chris’s adventure he seems to neglect all communication with his family and over look the fact that they care about his health and future.

All people want from life is to find happiness. We have learn that it’s not as easy as it looks, we have to search for it, maybe not literal but learning to love ourselves. Everyone tries hard enough to get what they desire and work hard for it, but we can’t see what the future holds, so no one knows exactly what might happen. Tragedy can sometimes come when we least expect them while searching for what we believe can bring us peace and satisfaction. We see this in the novel, Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer about a young man who is searching for what he believes might give him freedom, he goes on his own journey without knowing the end consequences. The author includes and arranges many features that help better understand why he wrote this

124). He furthers this by describing how Chris’ parents sent a letter saying” You have completely dropped away from all who love and care about you. Whatever it is—whoever you’re with—do you think this is right?” (p. 124). According to Krakauer, Chris saw this “as meddling and referred to the letter as stupid when talked to Carine” (p. 124). At this point, Krakauer is clearly pointing out Chris’ flaws and how he seemingly didn’t enough about his family to bother contacting them for long periods of time. He builds upon this when mentioning how Chris went on trans-continental journeys through the Mojave Desert and various places multiple times without saying a word. He even goes as far as to describe how in July 1992, 2 years after Chris left Atlanta, his mother awoke one night with tears rolling down her cheeks screaming, “I don’t know how I’ll ever get over it. I wasn’t dreaming. I didn’t imagine it. I heard his voice! He was begging, ‘Mom! Help me!’” (p. 126). Krakauer could have deliberately left out such disheartening details that portrayed Chris in a negative manner, as someone who would make his mother suffer in such a way, but he included them in order to give the reader as much perspective on Chris as possible.

This summer I read Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer. Into the Wild is a nonfiction novel depicting the adventures of Chris Mccandless. The novel also includes a short excerpt regarding Jon Krakauer’s adventure in Alaska. The author’s style of writing is boring and repetitive, even though the novel’s subject is intriguing. Before starting Into the Wild, I was excited to start reading, but as I got further into the book and the story wasn’t developing, I became bored and annoyed with the author's writing style of telling the interesting aspects of the story quickly, and expanding on minute details that had little relevance to the plot. Krakauer began the book by revealing the fate of Chris Mccandless and then proceeded to give unrelevant details until the final chapter where Krakauer proceeded to make the novel compelling. This was not the first time I have read a nonfiction novel and is the second time I read a novel written by Jon Krakauer. In eighth grade, I read Into Thin Air, which was a compelling and alluring novel that recounted his journey climbing Mt. Everest. My admiration of Krakauer’s work regarding Into Thin Air is the main reason I chose to read Into the Wild this summer. My opinion regarding the novel is based on Krakauer’s choice of writing style because the topic of the novel is even more intriguing than his other novels topics, but because of this being related to a short article he wrote in Outside Magazine, he only expanded on small details and focused less