Every year people die in the Alaskan wilderness. Some of these people are crazy and have no idea what they are doing. It was the opposite with Chris McCandless, as Jon Krakauer shows in Into the Wild. According to Krakauer, McCandless was not incompetent, but followed his own path. He shows this in chapter 8 by using the rhetorical strategy of examples and then comparing and contrasting.
In chapter 8 of Into the Wild, Krakauer uses several examples of other people who had ventured out into the Alaskan wilderness and died while there. The first example that he uses is that of Gene Rosellini or the Mayor of Hippie Cove. Rosellini spent much of his adult life in Cordova, Alaska. His goal was to live out an experiment to see if “...it was possible
to be independant of modern technology” (Krakauer 74). To do this he had to get away from civilization, similar to McCandless. They both wanted to live their lives away from the rest of the world. Krakauer also uses John Waterman as an example. Waterman was from the same part of Washington as McCandless. Both of their parents were well to do. However, Waterman’s dad left him when he was a teenager causing him to suffer emotional trauma. McCandless on the other hand left his parents. Both Waterman and McCandless had similar lives in the beginning, but they had different outcomes. Waterman went crazy while McCandless did not. The final example that Krakauer uses is Carl McCunn, an amateur photographer, who died in 1991. Both he and McCandless made one fatal error when out in the wilderness. Neither had an escape route to get out of the Alaskan Bush. Krakauer uses these examples to compare and contrast McCandless to Rosellini, Waterman, and McCunn. “Like Rosellini and Waterman, McCandless was a seeker and had an impractical fascination with the harsh side of nature” (85). While this could be seen as a death wish, wanting to be in nature does not make you a crazy person on a one way journey. Similar to Waterman and McCunn, McCandless did not have a lot of common sense. Not having a lot of common sense can be a bad thing, but just because you don’t have any does not make you crazy. Unlike others who had died in the backcountry, McCandless was not incompetent. He also did not have the characteristics of a crazy person. In chapter 8 of Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer uses examples and then comparing and contrasting to show how McCandless was not a nutcase. Instead McCandless is in his own category, of those who follow their own path.
The epigraphs presented by Krakauer before each chapter of the memoir Into the Wild dive deep into the life of Chris McCandless before and after his journey into the Alaskan wilderness. They compare him to famous “coming of age characters” and specific ideas written by some of his favorite philosophers. These give the reader a stronger sense of who Chris was and why he made the decision to ultimately walk alone into the wild.
In 1992, Christopher McCandless set off on an odyssey into the backcountry of Alaska, an adventure that had proved fatal. After McCandless's corpse was found, Jon Krakauer wrote an article on the story of Chris McCandless, which was released in the January 1993 issue of Outside magazine. The article had received a negative response; several readers criticized McCandless for being foolish and ill-prepared, and showed no sympathy or remorse for his death. McCandless has been referred to as a nut, a kook, and a fool. However, McCandless was not a nonsensical man. In 1996, Jon Krakauer's novel, Into the Wild, was published. The novel uncovers more detail of McCandless's story. Into the Wild rebuts the idea of McCandless being someone who is foolish, and speaks of the many occasions where McCandless has demonstrated great perseverance and determination. The novel also proves the intelligence of McCandless, and brings insight into McCandless's psyche. The following examples will illustrate how McCandless was not a fool, but someone to admire.
In the book Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer wrote about Christopher McCandless, a nature lover in search for independence, in a mysterious and hopeful experience. Even though Krakauer tells us McCandless was going to die from the beginning, he still gave him a chance for survival. As a reader I wanted McCandless to survive. In Into the Wild, Krakauer gave McCandless a unique perspective. He was a smart and unique person that wanted to be completely free from society. Krakauer included comments from people that said McCandless was crazy, and his death was his own mistake. However, Krakauer is able to make him seem like a brave person. The connections between other hikers and himself helped in the explanation of McCandless’s rational actions. Krakauer is able to make McCandless look like a normal person, but unique from this generation. In order for Krakauer to make Christopher McCandless not look like a crazy person, but a special person, I will analyze the persuading style that Krakauer used in Into the Wild that made us believe McCandless was a regular young adult.
One of the most important literary devices Jon Krakauer use in his novel is irony. By using this device, he depicts the breathtaking and heart-wrenching story of Christopher McCandless. On the first page of the authors note, Krakauer gives a synopsis of his novel. He writes, “In April 1992, a young man from a well-to-do East Coast family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. Four months later his decomposed body was found by a party of moose hunters” (Krakauer, ANI). However, McCandless himself is unaware that the fate of his excursion will prove to be abominable. He believes that his own physical competence and superior intellect will guarantee his survival in the Alaskan taiga. The fact that the reader knows Chris is dead within the first few sentences of the book but the character is portrayed as believing he is going to live is an example of situational irony. . This gripping introduction entrances the reader adding ...
Chris McCandless lived a life in which he disgusted by human civilization, and left it, eventually being led to his death in Alaska. McCandless entered the Alaskan wilderness severely unprepared, a brutal error that cost him his life. In the novel, Into the Wild by John Krakauer, Chris glances into his mindset by they way of his journal, history, and analysis of his life reveals that Chris McCandless as an arrogant and judgemental narcissist, while not mentally unstable, had a condescending attitude towards society and perished not only from his reckless stupidity but also from his unparalleled ego. Chris McCandless was immune to love and had an obsession with nature and society, him showing characteristics that created the appearance of McCandless
Life is a form of progress- from one stage to another, from one responsibility to another. Studying, getting good grades, and starting the family are common expectations of human life. In the novel Into the Wild, author Jon Krakauer introduced the tragic story of Christopher Johnson McCandless. After graduating from Emory University, McCandless sold of his possessions and ultimately became a wanderer. He hitchhiked to Alaska and walked into the wilderness for nearly 4 months. This journey to the 49th state proved fatal for him, and he lost his life while fulfilling his dream. After reading this novel, some readers admired the boy for his courage and noble ideas, while others fulminated that he was an idiot who perished out of arrogance and
Chris McCandless was a graduate from college whose dream was to go into the Alaskan wilderness and live there to get an overall experience of living off the land. McCandless wanted to experience how to hunt and gather everything that he needed to live in the Alaskan Wilderness. However was it a good idea when Mccandless went into the wild. Many people on his adventure tried to help him by giving him some equipment or buy him some because he wasn't prepared for his adventure. After McCandless’s death to this date people would say that McCandless is an idiot or stupid for not being prepared for the Alaskan wilderness.
In John Krakauer’s novel Into The Wild, the reader follows the life of a young man who, upon learning of his father’s infidelity and bigamy, seems to go off the deep end, isolating himself by traveling into the wild country of Alaska, unprepared for survival, where he died of starvation at 67 pounds.
Jon Krakauer, fascinated by a young man in April 1992 who hitchhiked to Alaska and lived alone in the wild for four months before his decomposed body was discovered, writes the story of Christopher McCandless, in his national bestseller: Into the Wild. McCandless was always a unique and intelligent boy who saw the world differently. Into the Wild explores all aspects of McCandless’s life in order to better understand the reason why a smart, social boy, from an upper class family would put himself in extraordinary peril by living off the land in the Alaskan Bush. McCandless represents the true tragic hero that Aristotle defined. Krakauer depicts McCandless as a tragic hero by detailing his unique and perhaps flawed views on society, his final demise in the Alaskan Bush, and his recognition of the truth, to reveal that pure happiness requires sharing it with others.
Chris McCandless is regarded as being something as a spiritual figure almost as a cult hero, some call him a disillusioned fool, some call him a great adventurer, and the debate still continues. As Matthew Power calls in his article, an article where he tells the story of McCandless,“The debate falls into two camps: Krakauer's visionary seeker, the tragic hero who dared to live the unmediated life he had dreamed of and died trying; or, as many Alaskans see it, the unprepared fool, a greenhorn who had fundamentally misjudged the wilderness he'd wanted so desperately to commune with.” Like so many stories covering Christopher McCandless’ death, both ends of the argument are discussed in an unfavored manner in the hopes to help develop an opinion on the McCandless story. This open ended question can only be answered open-endedly based on what the readers base for themselves as covered stories intend. Like Power has done, ...
The novel “Into the Wild” by Jon Krakauer goes into great detail to describe the main character, Chris McCandless, who died traveling alone into the Alaskan wilderness. McCandless, whom in the novel renamed himself Alex, left his home and family to travel to Alaska in 1992. In Alaska McCandless planned to live an isolated life in the desolate wilderness, but unfortunately he did not survive. This non-fiction novel portrays his life leading up to his departure and it captures the true essence of what it means to be “in the wild”.
In the novel, Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer uses an empathetic tone to explore people's experiences and stories with Chris McCandless to prove that McCandless was sane for those needing closure about his life. Everyone who came across Chris and was able to talk to him saw him for who he was, a true romantic. They saw that he was not just a crazed young man craving adventure, in search of his odyssey. By using anecdotes, comparisons, and, using his own personal experiences, relating to Chris, Krakauer is able to portray Chris as sane.
Subsequent Reaction: A second parallel is created by Krakauer when he describes his own hiking adventure up the Devil’s thumb. Krakauer continues to describe that the hike will change his life. Krakauer vision of climbing the Devil’s thumb alone mirrors Chris’ journey into Alaska. Consequently, creating a narrative parallel between Krakauer and
“Two basic ideals of modern man [are] the idea of free personality and the idea of life as sacrifice.”(Doctor Zhivago). When Zhivago wrote this he meant that people have the right to be who they are and live as they want. As long as they understand that throughout their life they will have to give up certain things in order to get by. Even in modern society this statement proves to be true. The book Into the Wild a true story written by Jon Krakauer proves this assertion through it’s main character Chris McCandless. His life was marred with painful sacrifices in order to find out who he wanted to be as a person. For example after college Chris left his family behind to go wander the country. Through this adventure Chris hoped to find out what
Also, it seems Stegner knows what humans need even though they are continuously unaware. “We need to demonstrate our acceptance of the natural world” (Stegner 406). Our job as Americans is to show how we care for the wilderness so that it might transfer these same feelings to different continents and cultures. If Americans abandon nature, so will every country who respects and models after us. The use of pathos throughout Stegner’s essay pleas with the reader to preserve and revive the wilderness for the benefit of humanity.