Persuasive Essay About Looking For Alaska

People tend to get fed up with life most of the time. They somehow always end up running away from their problems, or they end up pushing them away. Since Christopher McCandless was irritated by being around people, he decided to leave Atlanta for a journey to Alaska. McCandless’s journey to Alaska in 1990 was made because of the conflicts he had with others, the conflicts he had with himself, and the conflicts he had with nature once he got to his destination in Alaska.

The Past, an ever growing pool of time, is always biting at the heels of a person. It reminds him of what they have done wrong, done right, or when he did nothing. For most people, recalling the past leads to loose ends and blanks where memories should be. No matter how much a person may want to return to the past, it is not possible. It is lost forever. These forgotten moment lead to uncertainties and confusion in the present, and chaos in the future. Forgetting the past leads to spirals, spinning downwards as people look to what they have lost. They retrace their steps hoping to find a sliver of who they are and what may become of them. In the poem, Itinerary, Eamon Grennan shows how an individual searches through his past, but can never return to it. Through the poem and with a personal experience I will explain how individuals deal with uncertainties in their pasts.

Ultimately it is stressed that decisions have impact on the unknown, providing comfort as it implements two principles; that undesirable future events are able to be prevented and fixed and that desirable future events are able to be created. The comforting nature of these time travel principles illustrate that the notion of control alleviates fears as sublime ‘what if?’ scenarios are made possible and attainable.

“Choice is the basis of every part of your existence, but so is fear. The difference is, choice creates movement, where fear limits movement” (Gaudette, Réné). People can be products of the world they were born into; however, people have the opportunity to take different paths that can influence and determine their future. A rebellious person can give in and surrender by pressure; yet, a mature individual can calmly take the steps towards a recreation of a world that they want to live in. In the short story "Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?" by Joyce Oates, we are presented with Connie a rebellious and self absorbed teenager that becomes weak and surrenders to an unknown path because of pressure by two strangers.

The epigraph in The Fault in Our Stars by John Green explains the theme of time, time goes by fast so do not waste it, and the situation the main character is in. The main characters, Hazel and Augustus, both have cancer, and they know they do not have too much time left for both of them. They constantly talk about infinities and how everyone's infinities are different. Augustus tells Hazel that he is afraid of oblivion, but she responds by saying, "There will come a time...when all of us are dead.... There is time before organisms experienced consciousness, and there will be a time after. And if the inevitability of human oblivion worries you, I encourage you to ignore it..." (Green 12-13). Hazel wants to live life to the fullest without worry

So many people live within unhappy circumstances and yet will not take the initiative to change their situation because they are conditioned to a life of security, conformity, and conservatism, all of which may appear to give one peace of mind, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit within a man than a secure future (Krakauer, pp. 56-57).

“every generation , every man is a part of his past. He cannot escape it, but he may

“So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.” Even we live in the moment. It’s also a scene of crossings, bridging past and present. People struggle ahead but often obsess themselves with the past and present.

This meaning that we look forward to what is happening in our near future but when it comes to it we dwell on the past and the actions that we did and did not take in order to shape our future to the way that we had wanted ot to be shaped.

I partially agree with Pangloss’s statement because we never know what the future holds for us and we can never predict our fate therefor what happens to you today (now) or what you have is the best you can get or have in your live. For example, considering

In marquart’s memoir, she recounts north dakota with an honest, unglorified view of what it is and what it means to people. She uses contrasting diction and juxtaposition of subjects under a tone of honest admission.

Krakauer, Jon. Into the Wild. Chapter One, “The Alaska Interior,” (pages 5 – 8). Villard, 1996.

In relation to time, Mulisch demonstrates that wars and hidden emotions of the past prevail into a future that is not clear: “To dynamic personalities, the present is a ship that drives its bow through the rough seas of the future. To more passive ones it is rather like a raft drifting along with the tide” (151). No matter of whether the past takes a toll at a passive or active personage, no matter of whether you are controlling the boat in the “rough seas” or just passively admiring the “tide” and allowing it to control your path, the mirage of perfection in the future is not attainable without a resolution of the

about is his pessimistic outlook of life. “But starting now, in the world to which you go, failure

Summary: Looking for Alaska is the story of a young boy named Miles Halter who leaves his hometown in Florida in order to attend Culver Creek Preparatory High School in Alabama for his junior year. This boy loves reading biographies and especially memorizing last words of famous people. At Culver Creek, he meets new friends such as Chip his roommate also called Colonel, Takumi and Alaska a beautiful young girl with whom he will fall in love but cannot have since she already has a boyfriend named Jake. Unfortunately, under their influence, Miles starts smoking and drinking alcohol. One night after having drank a lot of alcohol, Alaska and Miles start to kiss but do not go further because Alaska