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Character Analysis Of Into The Wild

Decent Essays

We are all born into this world, never knowing what life has in store for us. It’s a journey that we are all not accustomed to, some of us grasp onto life and use its full potential, as others take the high road and use life as a chance of self exploration. The novel, Into the Wild, portrays a college graduate and successful homebody, Jonathan McCandless, taking a life’s journey that not even his parents expected. This character analysis will showcase how even in life, when one was given everything, we all have a choice to make our own path in life. The character analysis will also shine light on McCandless psyche, home life and the psychological theory to the why, behind his self exploration. Krakauer, the author of, Into the Wild, was able to discover, through mass interviews of the people McCandless met and letters McCandless wrote, personality and the reasons why he left his humble home life, to hitchhike into the unknown. Throughout the novel we learn that McCandless was a very intelligent man, who was raised in a proper household where education came first. He obtained his degree, at the will of his parents, at Emory University. Throughout his childhood McCandless had everything, a loving family, a warm home to live in, and was able to get an education. In a letter McCandless wrote to a friend that he made on his journey he states, “the very basic core of a man’s living spirit is his passion for adventure. The joy of life comes from our encounters with new

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