Mccandless's Response To Christopher Mccandless's Into The Wild?

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When Jon Krakauer published a story about the death of a young man trekking into the Alaskan frontier in the January 1993 issue of Outside magazine, the audience’s response to Christopher McCandless’s story was overwhelming. Thousand of letters came flooding in as a response to the article. Despite the claims, especially from the native Alaskans, questioning McCandless’s mental stability and judgement, it soon becomes clear that McCandless was not just "another delusional visitor to the Alaskan frontier" (4). As Krakauer retells the life of Christopher McCandless and gives his own take on the controversy around McCandless’s death in Into The Wild, the reader also creates his own opinion on both McCandless and Krakauer’s argument. Krakauer …show more content…

McCandless’s relationship with his father, Walt McCandless is far from the ideal father-son relationship. Walt, a renowned NASA space engineer, seeks a certain path for his son’s future that McCandless is very stubborn to follow. After an excellent academic record throughout high school and college, his future looks quite promising. However, his want to not follow his path set before him by his parents are made very clear from his youth. In the third grade, when offered to join an accelerated program for gifted students, McCandless refused simply since it would mean that he had to do more schoolwork. Since then it has been clear that “Chris marches to a different drummer” (107), as one of his teachers recalled. The clash between his own desired path and the societally defined path pushed on him by his parents would have created a very significant internal conflict and it would be only made worse by finding out about his father’s affair. When visiting his childhood home of El Segundo, California, he discovers the double life that his father had lived as he was still in a relationship with his first wife, Marcia, even after he had Chris with Billie. At this point, his relationship with his entire family, including very close his sister, completely deteriorates. To McCandless, This serves to confirm his doubts in societally defined path and becomes a major turning point at which McCandless now is steadfast in his plans to escape society and travel into the Alaskan wilderness. Even in Fairbanks, Alaska, right before he makes the final act of journeying into the wild, McCandless still shows the profound influence father as he looks upon a satellite developed largely in part by Walt McCandless. Krakauer emphasizes the extent of McCandless’s disconnection to his family now as he states that “If the

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