Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer

Throughout his adolescent to young adult years it was very clear that Chris had an attachment to the wild. In chapter 11, as Walt reminisces about Chris and their family camp trips he reflects, “‘Chris loved those trips, the longer the better . . .’”(108). Even at a very young age, Chris had a fascination about living within

After that accident, Chris realized that what he was doing was destroying his life. He didn’t have a relationship with his children and his wife didn’t talk to him. The drug addict went to a rehabilitation

decisions to leave his old life behind and start over. Chris’ decision to leave was

Krakauer recalls “the revelation that he was merely human” and like himself, his father had made mistakes in raising him out of love and longing for success from his son. “Two decades after the fact, I discovered that my rage was gone and had been for years” (148); two decades Chris was shorted. That time, though lengthy, had potential to heal wounds inflicted by his childhood fallout with his father. Krakauer contrasts his seemingly insignificant fallout with his father to Chris’ harsh one as a reconciliation is eventually reached. Jon implies that Chris’ isolationism causes minute insanity and uses that as a distinctive difference between the two hinting that his own sanity has contributed to his current livelihood and tolerable relationship with his father. After college and maturing, Krakauer comes to the realization that his father’s actions had been for the best and had Chris not acted so rashly by beginning a nomadic life with little belongings and personal ties, he would not have died in Alaska without contact to his family, whom he had once been close

When Chris went hitchhiking across the country it was a complete surprise to his whole family. It all happened in a single day when he decided to up and leave everything he had. There were many determining factors that lead to his unexpected disappearance, as well as lots of time of preparation and planning. It was just another day for everyone except Chris, everyone was going on with their lives but he had much bigger plans. He shared his plans no one but his sister who he was very close with since an

While the end of his journey is met with death, Chris shows to have been happy with his “odyssey”.

When writing in this book, Krakauer appeals to ethos by including several interviews with all the people that knew Chris. In chapter 2, Krakauer is interviewing Wayne Westerberg in Carthage, South Dakota. Westerberg was the first person Chris came into contact to when he left on his journey. After finding about Chris’s death, Westerberg told

Chris then, after graduating from Emory University, donated most of his savings to charity. He then took a path to the vagabond lifestyle and worked when necessary as a restaurant food preparer and a helping hand for farming. A good contrast between McCandless and Shepard, is that McCandless was not interested in the knowledge of wanting “...to know what day it is, or where i am. None of it matters” (Death of an Innocent 1). Once McCandless was on his way to Alaska, he did not want to take part in knowing what time or day it was when on his voyage. McCandless is well-known for his stubborn personality, while also having a different to abnormal thought process when finding solutions for solving worldwide problems. Chris was only 24 years of age when he died out in the abandoned bus. His survival out in Alaska lasted 4 months, where he ate a very poisonous plant that forced the human body to starve, no matter how many calories you

didn’t want to be told otherwise when he had made a decision or set a task. Chris wasn’t

One of Chris McCandless’s most foolish mistakes was failing to inform anyone on when he was planning to return. Chris made many new friends on his trip around America. He listened to their stories, learned from them, and told them about his plan to enter Alaska, but never talked about

and convince them that his death is on their hands. Not only did Chris complete what he was trying to

Chris is ambitious and motivated, after Chris excels academically he inspires himself to carry out the more difficult goal of surviving in the Alaskan wilderness with as little equipment as possible. When Chris leaves his life in Annandale after graduating Emory University he makes the decision to succeed on his own terms. Chris did not travel to

In the book Into The Wild by Jon Krakauer, Krakauer writes about Christopher McCandless, a young man who drops everything in his life to go travel throughout the states and end up in Alaska to find the truth to his questions. But did Chris find the truth he desperately desired? Some would say that McCandless did, other would say that he has wasted his time and was being ignorant and stupid. I agree with the author, Jon Krakauer, that Christopher McCandless was not a crazy lunatic, a sociopath, or an outcast because he had made lots of friends while traveling, but there were times when Chris was incompetent, even though he managed to stay alive for quite awhile. Christopher McCandless had a pretty normal childhood.

Krakauer reflects on the dynamics that might have caused a break between father (and mother) and son. Why did Chris disappear and stay out of touch with his parents for two entire years? Like his son, Walt McCandless was an intense individual, often mercurial and at times brooding. A NASA scientist and radar specialist, he was considered brilliant by his colleagues.

Chris mindset was to go there and survive because he loved challenges. On his way there he wanted to escape the real world and go into the wild free, before he left he donated his last of his savings which was twenty-five thousand to OXFAM America. It’s a charity that helps fight hunger, and he also abandoned his car and burned the rest of the money he had left in his wallet. the first month of so he