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Analysis Of Into The Wild By Jon Krakauer

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“I need to learn how to be content with simply not knowing, and be at peace with the notion that everything does not need an explanation.” I ran across this quote one day while scrolling through my newsfeed on Facebook and my mind immediately went to Into the Wild. The book takes a considerably different approach on sharing the story of a rebellious and ambitious young man who died in the Alaskan wilderness. Writer Jon Krakauer combines his own thoughts along with the accounts of others to the young adventurers’ letters and journal entries to recount the story of Christopher Johnson McCandless, who referred to himself as Alexander Supertramp. He was raised in Annandale, Virginia by a wealthy family. After graduating from college, Chris set …show more content…

Krakauer chooses to include this diction to show how important the trip is to McCandless. He called the trip an “Alaskan Odyssey” as well as an “Alaskan Deal” (56) in his letter to his close friend, Ron Franz. Chris repeatedly discussed the plans he had to travel to Alaska in many of his letters and journal entries because he was so passionate and fixed on the idea that it consumed his entire life. Author Jon Krakauer realizes this and gets readers to understand Chris’s need for adventure. I will admit that before reading, I wrote him off as a lunatic, but as I got into the book I quickly began to comprehend Chris’s desire for a desolate lifestyle. While retelling McCandless’s story, Krakauer also includes that Chris often spoke of this “ultimate adventure” (51) to his companion, Franz. In doing so, this shows Krakauer’s respect for Chris’s free-spirited …show more content…

In his journals, Chris would say things like “Alex is dumbfounded,” (34) and “the incident led Alexander to decide to abandon canoe and return north” (36). Because Krakauer chooses to share the journal entries written in third person, readers begin to wonder if Alex was the antisocial personality that wanted to explore “the wild” and if Chris was the side of him that could function in everyday society. Although Krakauer leads readers to ponder this, he does not try to sway their opinions one way or another. Instead, he introduces the idea that Chris is somewhat telling a story (“Vegas would not be the end of the story, however” [37].) through his journals--which, in return causes readers to wonder if Chris wanted people to remember

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