Chris Mccandless Transcendentalism Essay

Christopher Johnson McCandless, a reflection of modern transcendentalism.

Transcendentalism is a philosophical movement developed in the early-19 century. This literary movement based on the importance of God, man and nature, allowed numerous authors to become known. Nowadays, in a society full of innovations and in which nature is becoming less and less important, some people still feel the need to live far from the cities, in the wilderness, and still appreciate the simple concepts of life. Chris McCandless was one of them and decided to live a simple life by following the basic ideas of transcendentalism.

First and foremost, Chris McCandless, better known to the world as Alexander Supertramp, showed his transcendental beliefs by the way

he was living. One of the main ideas of the transcendentalist philosophy is the importance of the individual and that humans form one vast brotherhood. Throughout this book, Jon Krakauer shows different aspects of Chris’ personality: the reader can easily see Alexander Supertramp as a generous person. In fact, Alex wanted to help people and wanted to emphasize the mankind’s goodness. During high school, Chris has already been different than the other teenagers, his friend Walt admitted: “We spent the next few hours hanging out in creepy places, talking with pimps and hookers and lowlife. [...] He spent the ten bucks on a big bag of hamburgers, and we drove around handing them out to smelly guys sleeping on grates. It was the weirdest Friday night of my life. But Chris did that kind of thing a lot.” (Krakauer, 114). Instead of partying and having fun the same way as regular high-schoolers, Chris preferred to help people: to give them the attention and the moral support they needed. This simple example shows that, at an early age, Alex was already developing transcendentalist thoughts. In the same way, Christopher became obsessed with racial oppression in South Africa and wanted to fight for black people’s rights. In his book, Jon Krakauer wrote: “McCandless took life’s inequities to heart. During his senior year at Woodson, he became obsessed with racial oppression in South Africa. He spoke seriously to his friends about smuggling weapons into that country and joining the struggle to end apartheid.” (Krakauer, 113).
Moreover, Alex Supertramp lived with the idea of living as close to the nature as possible. Apparently guided by transcendental ideas he acquired by reading known authors, Chris wanted to explore the world that surrounded him and wanted to see God’s creations with his own eyes. His long journey started by telling his parents “I think I’m going to disappear for a while” on May 12, 1990, when he graduated from college. Step by step Christopher was becoming closer and closer to nature. “He saw the flash flood as an opportunity to shed unnecessary baggage. He concealed the car as best he could beneath a brown tarp, [...]. He buried his Winchester deer-hunting rifle and a few other possessions.” (Krakauer, 29). He started to live on the bare-minimum, abandoning his belongings and appreciating the small certainties of life. Besides, Supertramp showed his love of the nature in the letter he sent to his friend Ronald Franz. “You are wrong if you think Joy emanates only or principally from human relationships. God has placed it all around us. It is in everything and anything we might experience. We just have to have the courage to turn against our habitual lifestyle and engage in unconventional living.” (Krakauer, 57). McCandless, in this letter, was clearly telling his friend that, unlike what society believes, traveling and discovering the Earth is totally more worth it than having a normal, sedentary life.
On top of that, like the transcendentalist philosophers and authors, Christopher wanted to be different, to have a special life like no one ever had; he followed a life full of nonconformity and originality.

When he was young, Supertramp has already shown a non-formal behavior similar to civil disobedience. “The teacher explained at the beginning of the semester that because he had something like two hundred students, lab reports had to be written in a particular format to make grading them a manageable proposition. He did his lab reports, but not in the correct format, so the teacher gave him an F.” (Krakauer, 109). At a young age, McCandless started this anti-society behavior. Chris highlighted in a Tolstoy’s book: “I wanted movement and not a calm course of existence. I wanted excitement and danger and the chance to sacrifice myself for my love. I felt in myself a superabundance of energy which found no outlet in our quiet life.” (Krakauer, 15). McCandless has always lived his life in a different way than regular people and has never worried about what other people could think of him. Also, Alex has never had any relationship in his life and he has never truly needed one. In fact, he always felt quite uncomfortable when people talked about relationships. “I asked Alex if I could adopt him, if he would be my grandson. McCandless, uncomfortable with the request, dodged the question.” (Krakauer,

55).
To sum up, after all the details on Christopher Johnson McCandless’ life the reader can find in Jon Krakauer’s book Into the wild, it is an obvious fact that Christopher was a modern transcendentalist. In fact, his behavior is sufficient to show the reader the link between Chris and transcendentalism. The whole book shows how self-reliant, close to nature, generous, non-conformist and free McCandless was: it is the reason why Alex Supertramp is definitely a modern-day transcendentalist.
I personally agree with the ideas of transcendentalism even though I do not consider myself as a transcendentalist.

In fact, in my opinion, it would probably help our society to take into consideration these ideas: factories, cars, and cities in general pollute our planet more and more, what causes the increasing global warming. If more people were living with respect of nature or were simply giving more importance to nature, I believe that global warming would be a smaller problem. Besides that, I would assume that living as a transcendentalist allows you to live your life to the fullest. Living without caring about what someone can think of you, and acting the way you want in order to be happy to have a blooming life. Henry David Thoreau wrote in his book Walden: “I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” This quotation totally describes my point of view and totally represents the main ideas of transcendentalism for me: you need to live, without regrets nor

remorses.