There are a few number of people in this world that are fit for survival on the road. This is a tough and grueling lifestyle that is only meant for the strong willed. It is definitely not intended for everyone. In the book, Into the Wild, written by Jon Krakauer; a young man by the name of Christopher McCandless makes a daring decision that turns out to be mistake in the long run. After graduating from Emory University, McCandless had made a conscious decision to dispose of all his possessions, donated all of his $24,000 in his account to charity, and left his family to explore the wilderness of Alaska. His main objective was to get away from society, and to spend time with nature. But, was it all really worth it? I do not believe it was. Yes …show more content…
Move around, be nomadic.” (57) The advice given to Ron Franz by McCandless is basically preaching to Ron that he needs to go out and explore. He's saying to not just be another boring person who conforms to society, but to live life taking risks and trying something new every day. McCandless is a type of person who wants to make the most out of his life and not look back and say I should’ve done this or I should’ve done that. Not everyone in the world is like that. In fact there are very few people who live life like this. The advice given to Ron Franz is without a doubt intended for only certain type of people. It does not apply to everyone. It is for those who seek adventure and will take that to extreme measures. Not many people are willing to do that because there are many disadvantages of being on the road. For example, you are alone. You have no one else to help you. This means you have to get food on your own, find a shelter on your own, as well as find transportation on your own. In McCandless’s case, he burned all of his money and abandoned his car. He was limited on the necessary items he needed to survive. If you go into the wild lacking the essential matter you need to stay alive, more likely than not, you will not make it out alive. It’s almost physically impossible. And that goes with anyone who decides to do that. McCandless had made that choice on his own and he suffered the consequences. So that leads us back to the …show more content…
“It is the experiences, the memories, the great triumphant joy of living to the fullest extent in which real meaning is found.” (37) What McCandless found during his travels and what is being expressed in the quote is that the things that you experience in life are ultimately what causes true happiness. That was the whole purpose of why he decided to go out on his own. Because he believed that you wouldn’t be able to find happiness from the material objects, you discover it by learning the things that bring you joy from the experiences that you have encountered. Being able to be independent and having no one tell you what to do all the time is a big advantage of being alone. For example, the first time you leave your parents house and go off on your own to rent an apartment or something of that nature, that feeling of freedom and being independent is the same feeling that McCandless probably felt being on his own. Not having to abide to society’s rules and marching to the beat of your own drum must have been a great advantage for McCandless. It allowed him to experience the freedom that he's always looked for in his life, while building the opportunity to create change for
Many people dream about leaving everything behind and starting a new life, but it’s not as easy as it seems. Learning how to adapt to a new environment may be a challenge. In the book Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer, Christopher McCandless has no knowledge of the conditions he’s going to face when he arrives in Alaska. I would classify Christopher McCandless as a fearless crazy guy, because he leaves his well-shaped life behind. McCandless is not prepared for his expedition to Alaska, because he’s not familiar with the different lifestyles. Making all of these changes to his life like, detaching himself from his family and changing his name to Alexander Supertramp was a bad idea; because losing all of his connections means that he has no help from the people who really know him.
Both Thoreau and McCandless had a deep appreciation for solitude in nature. In Walden, Thoreau explains how he’d “... love to see Nature that is so rife with life that myriads can be afforded to be sacrificed and suffered to prey on one another; that tender organizations can be so serenely squashed out of existence..” (Thoreau, Walden 238). While being on his “adventure”, Thoreau was able to observe all of the little things in nature, and appreciate all of the little things. While in civilization, one would not be able to notice such things because there are much too many people around to notice. While on his journey, McCandless “No longer.
McCandless used the idea of escaping society from “Walden” by Henry David Thoreau and tried to mesh it together with the ideas of solitude and isolation to form his own beliefs. McCandless misinterpreted what Thoreau was saying. Thoreau states, “I had not lived there a week…It is true, I fear, that others may have fallen into it, and so helped to keep it open.” (Thoreau 3).Thoreau specifically states in this quote that he does not want others to follow or even go do what he did. He also did build the cabin a few miles away from a town because he knew he would go back one day. Thoreau was a sane person in doing this because crazy people stray too far away from society despite the consequences. He believed that he had other things to do with his life and not spending a minute more in that lifestyle. McCandless still went out into the wilderness away from society against Thoreau’s words. Chris was crazy to shun s...
To begin with, McCandless’s decision to walk into the wild was acceptable because he wanted to become an inspiration and an individual. Emerson states, “There is a time in every man’s education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance: that imitation is suicide” (Emerson). Chris McCandless left to shun the conformist society that he could feel changing him. Chris wanted the chains that bound him to be broken. Society takes the individual and locks it up and destroys it. According to Emerson, “It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion: it is easy to in solitude to live after our own: but the great man is he who in the midst of the crow keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude” (Emerson). McCandless left his materialistic family to be his own person ad to be unique. The world’s opinion does not make the man wh...
When he went into the wild he only had a bag of rice and a couple other tools to get food. Even after Jim Gallien asked to help McCandless convinced him that he was “fine with what [he’s] got” (Krakauer 6). His main goal was to live off the land and that's exactly what he did. He had some tools like a gun but for someone that was planning on being in Alaska for a while that's not a lot. It shows how skilled he really was, to be there for that long and only have that little. Also the gun he had wasn't that powerful and he killed a moose with it , showing he knows how to use what he has to fend for himself. McCandless had so much faith in himself that he didn't “ want to know what time it [was]” or where he was because “none of that [mattered]” (Krakauer 7). This shows that McCandless was fully dedicated to living off the land. Not knowing where you are or what time it is , is some people's worst nightmare. McCandless had enough faith in himself to know that even though he doesn't have that information he was still going to survive in the wild. He believed in himself and his dreams as he walked into the Alaskan wilderness with his head held high.
...fe for oneself. McCandless primary tragic flaw being his unwillingness to form long-term relations brought him both to the happiest moment of his life, but also to his demise. McCandless never had a problem with people, but rather with the status quo of society, the idea that a man or a woman has to live inside of a coordinate plane. McCandless left home and went on his adventure simply for his own well being, he achieved both what he wanted to accomplish while learning a valuable lesson along the way. He learned that happiness must be shared, and while everyone has his or her flaws, it is important to let these go. Christopher McCandless should teach people the importance of following your dreams, and the importance of enjoying the natural serenity of life.
Chris McCandless was a young man who did everything in his power to try and represent that freedom he was searching for. McCandless had everything before we went out but he decided to go out and travel by choice. He was considered a selfish man because when someone offered him to help him he rejects it in a nice way since we wants to do things himself. In the book Into the wild he states that,"You don't need to worry about me. I have a college education. I'm not destitute. I'm living like this by choice."
To be on the road for long periods of time is not meant for everyone to experience. Only a few can stay on the road and function normally. Living in the wild is not healthy especially for our generation who, for the most part, does not know much about living in the wild. When you search up the definition of wildlife it comes up as "wild animals collectively; the native Fonda of a region". Wildlife is another way of living however, when our generation has become accustomed to living one type of lifestyle, living on the road or in the wild is not something that can be easily done. Not only is our generation used to living that type of way also the way our society looks at things to live in the wild and on the road is completely unethical. Even though it is possible to live out in the wild Chris Mccandles is a great example on why people should not be on the road. Living on the road is completely difficult and not only does it take a strong-minded and determined person to do it also takes physically strong person to
Living in the wilderness is difficult, but understanding the meaning of such lifestyle is even more difficult. One of the Christopher’s admirable qualities was that he was well aware of what he was doing. He knew about the difficulties and dangers that he would face into the wilderness, and was mentally prepared for that. Author Jon Krakauer says that “McCandless was green, and he overestimated his resilience, but he was sufficiently skilled to last for sixteen weeks on little more than his wits and ten pounds of rice. And he was fully aware when he entered the bush that he had given himself a perilously slim margin for error. He knew precisely what was at stake” (182). McCandless was an educated youth, who loved nature and dreamed of living in the Alaskan wilderness. Although he ignored to take many necessary things with him on this
McCandless was not the 'sit down and take it in stride' kind of person. If he saw something wrong, something he did not agree with, he would try to fix it, or help in any way that he could. He was inherently compassionate, a man of his principles; owned by the rules that he governed himself with. It is apparent that he had always been an idealistic dreamer, and had always believed himself capable of much, because as his friend shared: “He'd say 'Come on,...
To start with, McCandless was not someone who gave up. Despite others trying to scare him out of continuing with his journey into the Alaskan wilderness, nothing deterred McCandless. He anxiously awaited to experience life off the land. The people McCandless encountered on his way to Alaska often commented on his determination. Jim Gallien, a man who drove McCandless into the Alaska interior, described McCandless as “real gung-ho”. McCandless's attempt to undertake such a risky endeavour is something to admire in itself. To travel two years, mostly on foot, is certainly not an easy task. However, McCandless still persevered through the hardships he faced throughout his journey. McCandles...
Consequently, he also shows us the difficulties that most do not expect upon leaving for such a journey. Many speak about the advantages, like the freedom they enjoy, and the wondrous relationships formed along the way; but even so, some disadvantages outweigh the advantages, like the It creates such a unique situation for everyone that you would have never known otherwise. Such was the case of Ronald Franz and McCandless, when their paths crossed in January of 1992. In the text, a bit of dialogue was, “When he returned to McCandless’s camp and launched into the self-improvement pitch, though, McCandless cut him off abruptly “Look, Mr Franz,” he declared, “you don’t need to worry about me. I have a college education.
... in his attempt to run away from himself, he was unable to truly escape Christopher McCandless. And although he was not truly successful in running away from his identity, McCandless appeared to succeed in running away from society and running away from the predictability of what life would bring. Departing from the heavy burdens he found in his society, his life, and the world was the only way McCandless seemed to truly be happy and he did just that. He let go of his worrying and concern and focused on bettering himself by connecting with nature. Eventually, McCandless realized that happiness is only real when it is shared (189) but without running away from society and the people who cared about him, he would not have stumbled upon that realization.
In the book Into The Wild, there is a man that had ventured off when he was about 22 years old. He had a pretty good life prior to him venturing off. His parents had fairly well off jobs; his father being an antenna specialist for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA); and his mother worked as a secretary at Hughes Aircraft. After some time, his mother and father started their own business that was a home-based consulting company that ended up being very successful. His parents, and family friend (who gave him $24,000 to continue into law school) wanted him to pursue the opportunity to go into law school, which everyone had high hopes for him. He had the great grades in college, awesome work ethics, he had it all; but one day he just went off without notice, and went on an adventure to find enlightenment and self discovery. In Chris McCandless’s life, people would argue that his life was about discovery and enlightenment, or ignorance and loss because it does seem that he gives up everything good in his life on a foolish walk-about; but others see that life isn't just about materialistic items, it's more of peace at mind, freedom of doing what you want, not being governed by the rules, or laws around you, and that life is just more than what people give you, it's about being natural, freeing yourself from everything; and I believe that his life was about discovery and enlightenment, and I do think he had found that exact thing.
McCandless was a fearless human being. I think that most of the people’s ideologies and personalities have to do with how they were raised by the parents and everything that was taught to them. When a lack of love exists from a parent towards his child, a hate can be created without knowing it. McCandless could have gone away from society to escape reality or, for being in a place where he could find himself at peace. Either one, we can assume that he obviously had different ideas about civilization; the idea of having a life full of danger and adventure inspired and excited him.