An Analysis of Nature:
A Comparison of Shaw and Krakauer
“I quickly came to understand that climbing Everest was primarily about enduring pain. And in subjecting ourselves to week after week of toil, tedium, and suffering, it struck me that most of us were probably seeking, above else, something like a state of grace.” (Krakauer Into thin Air, 133) As Krakauer says in this quote, many people use the beauty of nature as a form of self satisfaction. Enduring pain and suffering while in nature makes some people feel accomplished and changed. Krakauer himself sees mountain climbing as a way to achieve inner peace, and feel content with life. I share the opinion that nature is seen as a beautiful challenge, and can help bring someone to their true potential. Krakauer’s opinions on nature show the idea that conquering nature, can satisfy and ease desire. Among my own opinions, I think the same as Krakauer, even if our experiences are vast in comparison. I share similar perspectives about how the outdoors can affect one’s conscious and strive them to achieve personal goals as Jon Krakauer.
“There's something about being afraid, about being small, about enforced humility that draws me to climbing.” The feeling of being challenged by nature, has brought Jon Krakauer to his passion for mountain climbing. Krakauer explains his passion for mountain climbing the best, he enjoys the rush that the danger gives him. Krakauer himself has stated that he has used nature as a form of self satisfaction, in his book Into the Wild, he briefly talks about an endeavor that nearly killed him when
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he was climbing. “I thought climbing the Devil's Thumb would fix all that was wrong with my life. In the end, of course, it changed almost nothing” (Krakauer Into the Wild 156). Krakauer had the drive to do reckless things in hopes to achieve happiness. He realizes how it did not change his life, and brought him to face some personal issues as later explained. This is not uncommon in his life, he’s spent years going on expeditions to Mt. Everest, and immersing himself in conquering a number of other mountains. A large portion of his life has been devoted to spending time in nature, he’s found his passion and it helps him move along with any issues he faces. Krakauer’s love for this has constantly driven him to success, and fame as well. He found his true talent in nature, and he’s made a living out of it. He’s acknowledged the way nature takes control of him, and he’s managed to maintain it. “My hunger to climb had been blunted, in short, by a bunch of small satisfactions that added up to something like happiness” (Krakauer Into thin Air 230). Climbing mountains has only subsided his passion for a short period of time, he always goes back into nature to pursue himself. I relate to Krakauer’s feeling of being unsatisfied without having challenges, it’s a problem i’ve found solutions to also. As I analyze myself, I share the same opinion that going out in nature and accomplishing challenges is extremely satisfying. While it can change the mind and your mood in a positive way, it does not have a long lasting effect, much like Jon described. Having grown up underneath a mountain, I’ve always gone out and embraced nature and seen it as a challenge. I’ve done a lot of memorable things in nature, and experienced things that have made me feel satisfied with myself. I see nature as a therapeutic place to release any tension you have in life. Sometimes If i’m not doing something to challenge myself, I often feel like i’m wasting my time, which will result to me going outside. When I wrote the paper sitting out by the creek, I felt “the urge to go out and do something great right now as I’m sitting here” (Shaw Line 16). In my own words, I can express how I’m overwhelmed in nature to go do something great. Nature inspires me and shows all the possibilities of things I can do, you’re free of restrictions. Relating my own emotions to to Krakauer's, I have known that feeling of filling an empty space. I think that a lot of people go out to experience something to change their life, much like I want to. Some people die trying to exceed their limits, and the opinions I share can be seen as dangerous. “If anything, it makes me want to embrace life more.” (Line 14) I use nature as my source for energy to do things, going out and feeling the sun and being awake. Nature is something that everyone feels compelled by, it’s impossible not to. If someone feels connected to nature, by spending time in it, they may feel the need to protect the environment. One could compare these views to the same of a transcendentalist, Krakauer has been called that oftenly. However I don’t think that he is, it’s commonly confused that an individual’s passion for nature, is an obsession to freedom. To bring this comparison essay to a conclusion, Krakauer is someone who I have placed a lot of respect for.
His views have matched what I stand for, and I believe that they truly identical. However, my experiences with nature are unmatched to his,in later years I may change mine entirely. I merely think that in my short life, I’ve managed to figure out how nature can positively benefit
me.
Chapter 7: In chapter 7 Krakauer talks about how Everest has changed from a professionals trek to anyone's trek. He explains that many inexperienced people have climbed Mount Everest with the help of sherpas and guides. He also mentions about the determination of Everest and how in some instances in history people who weren't allowed into Tibet or Nepal but they snuck in and managed to climb and summit Everest
Throughout the novel, the protagonist encounters many difficulties when trying to reach his goal of climbing Mount Everest. He encounters problems, from illnesses to deaths but most affectively the catastrophic weather. When Krakauer’s 5 friends die, including Rob Hall, Krakauer takes responsibility of the other climbers and helps them get through the tough weather safely. When they arrived to the base camps, many of the climbers gave up but Krakauer kept trying, he was motivated by Halls death to reach the top of Mount Everest. Krakauer finds ways to get around
Krakauer also adored what nature had in store for his yearning for intriguing natural events. In is youth, he “devoted most of [his] waking hours to fantasizing about, and then undertaking, ascents of remote mounts in Alaska and Canada” (134). Shown by the time he spent dreaming, people can infer him as a person who deeply admires nature. At the age of eighteen, Ruess dreamed of living in the wilderness for the sake of fascination. He wandered to find events that could surprise him until his near death, in which he decided to find the more ...
Since publishing the book, McCandless has become an immense presence in Krakauer’s life and writings. “Into the Wild” eventually earned a National Bestseller ranking. The profits of his National Bestseller have no doubt benefitted him as well. “Into the Wild” is often discussed and studied in High Schools and Colleges. The book has become so popular with these learning institutions is in part its controversial nature, and the transcendentalist overtones. Krakauer is able to provide his ethos in the article by indicating his authority on all things
By comparing Krakauer’s own life experiences and other peoples too to McCandless, he gave a little perspective and demonstrated that the negative remarks of many people were not correct for someone else had performed the same thing. Krakauer compared his youth mistakes to Chris McCandless by appealing to pathos since many other adolescents make them as well. First of all, Krakauer warned the reader, “I interrupt McCandless story with fragments…from my own youth…I do so in the hope that my experiences will throw some oblique light on the enigma of Chris McCandless,” (Krakauer’s note). He stated there that he ‘hopes’ to make a better presentation of McCandless’s life for he wanted to show that he deserves respect. He mirrored his own experiences and explained why he did it to draw some conclusion on why McCandless did it as well. Krakauer also said that he threw some ‘oblique light’ meaning that he attempted to make him appear better for he thought that Chris McCandless had to be a valued guy. A quote that proves the ‘oblique light’ that Krakauer threw was when he said, “Edwards regarded climbing as a “psycho-neurotic tendency”; he climb not for sport but to find refuge from the inner torment that framed his existence” (Krakauer 135). Krakauer wrote about this ...
Jon Krakauer interpreted his own ideas of transcendentalism while creating the novel Into the Wild. Krakauer believed that McCandless plays a very important role in the idea of a transcendentalist. He created Into the Wild by telling the riveting...
According to what McCandless was trying to say, “It is easy, when you are young, to believe that what you desire is no less than what you deserve, to assume that if you want something badly enough, it is your God-given right to have it” (Krakauer 155). Similarly, Krakauer stated that, “When I decided to go to Alaska that April, like Chris McCandless, I was a raw youth who mistook passion for an insight and acted according to an obscure, gap-ridden logic” (155). He presumed that if he climbed the Devils Thumb, then it would fix everything that was wrong with his life. Krakauer said that, “In the end, of course, it changed almost nothing. But I came to appreciate that mountains make poor receptacles for dreams. And I lived to tell my tale” (155). However, McCandless did not come to that realization and unfortunately did not live to tell his
When thinking about nature, Hans Christian Andersen wrote, “Just living is not enough... one must have sunshine, freedom, and a little flower.” John Muir and William Wordsworth both expressed through their writings that nature brought them great joy and satisfaction, as it did Andersen. Each author’s text conveyed very similar messages and represented similar experiences but, the writing style and wording used were significantly different. Wordsworth and Muir express their positive and emotional relationships with nature using diction and imagery.
I was reading a novel and travelling to places I have never been. From the way he wrote people could see the beauty of nature and also his passion as an advocate for wilderness. Many call him as “Father of National Parks.” He strongly believed that lands should be protected and never turn into grazing pastures.as he mentioned, “The disappearance of the forests in the first place, it is claimed may be traced in most cases directly to mountain pasturage” ...
From the lone hiker on the Appalachian Trail to the environmental lobby groups in Washington D.C., nature evokes strong feelings in each and every one of us. We often struggle with and are ultimately shaped by our relationship with nature. The relationship we forge with nature reflects our fundamental beliefs about ourselves and the world around us. The works of timeless authors, including Henry David Thoreau and Annie Dillard, are centered around their relationship to nature.
Krakauer, Jon. The. The “Into the Wild”. New York: Anchor Books, 1996. Print.
In Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer explores the human fascination with the purpose of life and nature. Krakauer documents the life and death of Chris McCandless, a young man that embarked on an Odyssey in the Alaskan wilderness. Like many people, McCandless believed that he could give his life meaning by pursuing a relationship with nature. He also believed that rejecting human relationships, abandoning his materialistic ways, and purchasing a book about wildlife would strengthen his relationship with nature. However, after spending several months enduring the extreme conditions of the Alaskan wilderness, McCandless’ beliefs begin to work against him. He then accepts that he needs humans, cannot escape materialism, and can never fully understand how nature functions. Most importantly, he realizes that human relationships are more valuable than infinite solitude. McCandless’ gradual change of heart demonstrates that exploring the wilderness is a transformative experience. Krakauer uses the life and death of Chris McCandless to convey that humans need to explore nature in order to discover the meaning of life.
Classic literature juxtaposes two ways of life that illustrate the poles of true happiness: a life of adventure, exemplified by Odysseus (The Odyssey), and the life at home, which poets and farmers represent. In The Iliad, Achilleus chooses to live a short, glorious life, even though he could have chosen to live a long life in anonymity. Arguments have been put forth that the life of adventure is a living hell, as Achilleus testifies from Hades after his death - in hindsight, he would have settled for the life of a slave and given up his glory, if only he could have lived longer. Alternately, the life of the (metaphorical) farmer has been despised as simple and ordinary, when true immortality is only attained with great accomplishments, such as sacking Troy or surviving heroic adventures which are then recorded. In a modern day autobiography of the 1996 ascent of Mt. Everest (Sagarmatha to the Nepalis, or “goddess of the sky”), Jon Krakauer reveals the human motivation behind adventure and tells the story of the men and women who lived and died on the expeditions to the summit during that spring (Into Thin Air). With epic literature and a recent epic, I will illuminate the values of a reflective life as well as the life of adventure, and delve into the necessary components of the ‘good life.’
Jon Krakauer is famously known for his books and articles about mountaineering and narrative non-fiction books. At the age of eight years old, Krakauer was introduced into the sport of mountaineering by his father. When Jon was in his late twenties, early thirties, he worked as a carpenter, fishermen, and a writer. Many of Jon's articles about mountain climbing appear to show up in many of his publications including, Rolling Stone, National Geographic, and The New Yorker. Jon Krakauer is the best selling author of Where Men Win Glory and many other bestselling non-fiction books such as, Into Thin Air, Into the Wild, and Under the Banner of Heaven. All of these books portray an extraordinary, revealing portrayal of a young man's haunting expedition. John received a degree in environmental science from Hampshire college in Massachusetts in 1976. A few days after graduating, Jon Krakauer spent around three to five weeks alone in the wilderness of Alaska and climbed a new route called the Devil's Thumb, his experiences were well described in previous books like, Into the Wild and Eiger Dreams. Jon Krakauer's most knowledgeable mountain climb was the directed climb to Mount Everest which was greatly known as the 1996 Mount Everest disaster. The truthful memory of this event would be told in the book "Outside", and continued in the book Into Thin Air, in which I read last year for a book report. In saying
There are fifty-three fourteen thousand foot peaks in colorado. Aron Ralston is one of only a few people who climbed these peaks in solo attempts during the winter. However, that is not the only adventure, he has climbed countless mountains and hiked all over the world. In some of these journeys he choses to go alone but in many of them people from all walks of life join him. Aron could be described as an adventurer or a free spirit and some people have gone so far to say that he is a transcendentalist. A transcendentalist is a person who strays from the normal path of life and creates their own. After, reading the book Between a Rock and a Hard Place and learning about Aron’s lifestyle and personality, it can be determined that he does not