Examples Of Transcendentalism In Into The Wild

Many people desire to make drastic changes to their lifestyle in order to bring joy to their lives. In the movie Into the Wild, Chris McCandless is tired of his life and dreams of a lifestyle that embodies transcendental themes such as self-reliance and living alone in nature, but when he starts living this lifestyle and truly embodying these themes he learns that this transcendental life is not as fulfilling as a life surrounded by people who care about him. Throughout his journey he goes out of his way to make himself reliant on only himself by scarcely using money. Chris romanticizes nature and dreams of living serenely in the isolated Alaskan wilderness. However, once in the wilderness he struggles to survive once he is completely self-reliant

Chris clearly loves the idea of living in nature much more than living within society. In his letter to Wayne Westerberg, he says, “I’ve decided that I’m gonna live this life for time to come. The freedom and simple beauty of it is too good to pass up.” While travelling the country, Chris experienced a sense of freedom that he had never felt before in his life since he went on this journey directly after graduating from college. Once he made it to the Alaskan wilderness, he had complete control over his own life. He was completely by himself in the wild, so there was no one around to tell him what to do or stop him from doing whatever he wanted to do. He also was enamored by beauty of the Alaskan wilderness. Chris clearly appreciates the beauty of nature throughout his journey. When he visits Los Angeles on his journey, he is disgusted at its ugliness and leaves immediately. After becoming accustomed to listening to peaceful sounds such as birds chirping and running water, it is hard to adjust to the loud and obnoxious sounds of a city. Being re-exposed to this modern way of living made Chris yearn even more for the Alaskan wilderness, a place that didn’t have its natural beauty corrupted by humans. Just like Henry David Thoreau, Chris wanted to live a life on simplicity. While in Alaska, Chris spent his days hunting for food and reading, a lifestyle much more simplistic than his previous lifestyle. In Thoreau’s essay describing his venture into the woods, he wrote, “Our life is frittered away by detail. An honest man has hardly need to count more than his ten fingers, or in extreme cases he may add his ten toes, and lump the rest.” In this quote, Thoreau stresses the importance of a simplistic life, a belief that is shared by Chris. Although Chris wants to go to Alaska because he desires a simplistic and free life