How Did Chris Mccandless Change Society

Chris McCandless, as described in John Krakauer’s book “Into the Wild,” endured many grueling tasks and hardships throughout his odyssey in the wild, but ultimately died of starvation and exposure from the elements. What would have happened if Chris survived and came back to society? If Chris changed his thought’s on how society worked, he might still be here with us today,but it would be difficult to imagine him changing his mind. During his time in the wild, Chris became inspired or enlightened by being alone. If he came back to society, he would be disappointed just like he was before. Quoting from Chris’s journal, Krakauer writes that “[t]o get an ID and a job feels extremely uncomfortable in society now [to chris] and must return to the road

Immediately.” Krakauer (27). Chris rejectected the way society was organized. He enjoyed his life while out in the wild because he did not have any rules to live by, living his life outside of everything. It would be hard for him to blend back into the modern world.

He could not come back into society without sacrificing his freedom, and would have to get used to all the rules that he ignored while outside in the wild. He would regret coming back into society and would undoubtedly want go back to the freedom he was living. In a poetic note he left found inside the bus, “[t]wo years he walks the earth. No phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes. Ultimate freedom. An extremist. An aesthetic voyager whose home is the road… And now after two rambling years comes the final and greatest adventure. The climactic battle to kill the false being within and victoriously conclude the spiritual pilgrimage… No longer to be poisoned by civilization he flees, and walks alone upon the land to become lost in the wild,” (122) In these verses, Chris shows that his happiness is in the freedom of the wild. He talks about all the worldly possessions that he has given up for what he believes is true happiness. It would be extremely hard, if not impossible, for him to get fully use to society life again, because as he describes in some parts in the book and in the quote above, nothing is comparable to the ultimate freedom that is found in the

wild.
While in his time in school, Chris was a very high achiever and worked hard for many of the possessions and successions he had earned before he had before he left for Alaska. Chris had a good life set out for him but he had strong feelings against how his life was going because he did not like the rules or guidelines that everyone else was living by. As krakauer writes. “Chris graduated from Emory University in Atlanta...and had distinguished himself as a history and anthropology, major with a 3.72 grade point average…” Krakauer (16) But for Chris, life wasn’t about going along with everyone else on the same path until death, it was about finding the meaning of true happiness or finding one’s own way to enlightenment. With this idea, he separated himself from the set rules and obligations of the modern life. This is significant to Chris’s story because once he left modern day life, it would be very hard to go back and start all over again. During his time wandering before he left for Alaska, Chris received much help and guidance from people, and many attempted to persuade him out of his plans to head to Alaska, but they never convinced him. He seemed to believe that people were wasting their time going through the motions and not experiencing full happiness and the fullest life has to offer. His thoughts expressed at the very end of the book suggest that he would have no choice but to seek medical attention, both physically and mentally to be able to survive in modern society.
Some might suggest that he could adapt to society fairly quickly and live the rest of his life from the place from which he left, but never really came to accepting his place in society because he had still believed that he would just be wasting his life. In conclusion, even if Chris could have returned to society, it would have been such an extremely, if not impossible change for him go back. But assumingly Chris had thought the same way that he had before when he was living his life in the wild, then he could have gone back to the wild without a second thought.