Into The Wild Chris Mccandless Characterization

Thoughts upon “Into The Wild” and a Characterisation of Christopher McCandless

Christopher McCandless is the main character in the novel "Into the Wild" by John Krakauer. He is an intelligent young man, who has his own ideas about how life is best lived, which is alone in the nature. He believes it is the only way to get a taste of the beauty that the earth beholds and to appreciate it. He comes from a family with more traditional values than his own. The household consists of two parents and a sister. The parents have had many fights and intern troubles throughout Chris's childhood, which has influenced him and maybe even have been the root of Chris's liberal and rebellious ideas. . In the prelude, Chris decides, like a rebellious teenager, to break out of his family and all the rules, expectations and responsibilities that follow a college graduation, and creates his new identity Alexander Supertramp. The creation of this alias illustrates Chris's rejection of his parents and their son they raised with their values. It places him together with other American characters who change their names and reinvent their identity, for example Jay Gatsby, born and raised as James Gatz from F.

Maybe he was too immature to see that his actions were selfish. He could have notified his parents and sister, whom he claimed to love, about his plan. He could have explained why he chose to do what he did, instead of letting the family suffer in ignorance about his future.
Like Janis Joplin indicates by singing: “Freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose”, freedom is only achieved when you are alone and penniless. Christopher have maybe thought of “nothing left to loose” as material items, and forgotten that love, even though it is abstract, is something you carry with you everywhere you go and is almost impossible to get rid of – therefore having something to loose is