Into the Wild

Brilliant and Unforgettable

His book was one of the most haunting, unforgettable reads in recent years for me. I was mezmerized by passages in the author's other best-selling masterpiece Into Thin Air, such as the passage involving stranded and doomed guide Rob Hall, near the Everest summit, talking to his pregnant wife via satellite phone to discuss names for their unborn child. However, I was unprepared for the depths of emotion felt in reading Into the Wild - it literally kept me up at nights, not just reading but thinking about the book in the dark.

Some reviewers criticized the book because they thought McCandless demonstrated a naive and unhealthy lack of respect for the Alaskan wilderness. This is no hike on the Appalachian Trail - Chris was literally dropped off by a trucker into the middle of nowhere, with no provision stores, guides, or means of assistance nearby at his disposal. He had a big bag of rice and a book about native plants, designed to tell him which plants and berries he could eat. "How could he have been so stupid?", they ask.

Well, I certainly didn't feel compelled to give away my belongings, pack some rice and a Tolstoy novel and walk into the woods after reading the book, but the author does a remarkable job of exploring McCandless the person, including passages derived from interviews with the many poeple whose lives he touched in his odyssey as he drove and then hitch-hiked cross country from his well-to-do suburban home. Some of the more touching parts of the book involved tearful reminisces by some of these old aquaintances when they learned he had perished.

Krakauer also throws in for good measure an illuminating passage about a similar death-defying climb that he foolishly attempted at about the same age as McCandless, with little training and preparation, providing insight into what makes a person attempt a dangerous climb or hike. He even tells several fascinating tales, all of them true, of other recreational hikers who were stranded in the wilderness.

By the end of the book, I thought I understood McCandless' character, and I thought Krakauer was probably right in putting his finger on exactly what caused his death. I was moved by his plight regardless of his possible foolishness in venturing into Denali, and the final scenes involving Chris' family were emotionally devastating. You need not be an outdoorsman to appreciate it, and in fact unlike Into Thin Air the book is completely accessible to those who know nothing about the subject. I think this book is destined to become a classic.

INTO THE WILD...INTO YOUR HEART

A young man tests himself in the wild

Krakauer felt drawn to Chris McCandless because as a young man, he also had tested himself against nature and danger by attempting a solo climb of the Devil's Thumb. This affinity led him on the trail of what happenend to Chris, intuitively finding the motive and thoughts that were not revealed in the little notebook that Chris left behind in an abandoned shell of a bus, where he met his end in the wilds of Alaska.

Strangely, Chris might have survived were it not for a simple and understandable mistake, or if he had taken more than the extreme minimum with him on his quest. Some people felt he had sought his death and that his adventure was suicidal. However, his struggle was heroic and probably was a case of a very intense and sincere young man trying to test himself in the purest way, against the monstrous forces of nature.

This is a sad story, but also uplifting in a way. The intensity of Chris McCandless and his search for himself won't be forgotten by anyone who reads this book.

Brilliant, subtle, and unforgettable

Krakauer tells the tale effectively. He uses an intelligent vocabulary balanced with a conversational writing style. He easily held my attention as the facts unfolded throughout, employing logic and drawing inferences to fill in many questions that remain. He obviously did his research on the central character, Christopher McCandless, and must have invested countless quantities of money and time to gather accurate information. With so many of the facts of this distressing story remaining obscured probably forever, his assumptions and extrapolations about Chris' actual fate are posed as theories rather than as irreproachable conclusions. I appreciate this aspect of Krakauer's account.

Hats off also to the McCandless family, since Krakauer relied upon them not only for information about their son, tragically lost, but also for their courage in allowing many private family issues to be exposed in support of telling the story as thoroughly as possible. Chris' father, mother, and sister are true heroes in my eyes.

I have some degree of understanding of Chris and his northerly wanderlust, and also an appreciation for the not-so-uncommon desire to conquer the wilderness. What concerns me, however, is the apparent arrogance of the central character. According to the author's account, Chris seemed to possess an intermittent wariness about his closest acquaintances, along with outright rejection of others who cared for him much more than he cared for them. He treated some important people who crossed his path as disposable. But probably Chris's most crucial deficiency was the flippant and over-confident approach towards the actual work of survival in the wilderness. He even seemed a bit contemptuous toward relevant learning despite his quality education and intelligence. He especially needed important knowlege about survival in the wilds of the north. However, he apparently rebuffed all attempts from others to assist him in his quest. I have spent considerable time in the extreme north of B.C. (an area not entirely dissimilar to Alaska): it is ridiculous, misguided, and presumptuous to embark on such an adventure with the dearth of equipment, supplies, and knowledge as did Chris. I would want to know everything possible about how to survive such a life and death endeavor. Indeed, I feel a strange combination of sadness and anger as I reflect on Chris's unfortunate departure. Was his death ultimately caused by youthful innocence or arrogant ignorance? It is a question I cannot answer and I commend Krakauer for his deft ability to stimulate thought in the reader rather than provide tidy little assumptive answers.

My only complaint: the personal reflective chapter towards the end of the book. I understand why Krakauer included it (personal connections with the need for adventure, context, struggles with nature, etc.), but for me it was irrelevant and it de-railed the flow of the story.

Perhaps we can learn from Christopher McCandless' experience, not in any attempt to qualify him as a martyr or to label him a fool. I have thought about how my appreciation for the north has changed, how families need to be close, the requirement to really listen to and understand people, and countless other themes which have been tweaked by Jon Krakauer's writing about Chris' misadventure. I recommend this book highly.

Facinating! (Sorry it's so long, but read on...)

I can understand how one can get confused with the shifts in location and time during McCandless's two year journey, but retracing the man's steps should not be the focus. Krakauer enlightens the reader and unfolds the mystery of McCandless's death as interviews, childhood experiences and stories of similar adventurers give greater insight to the man's psyche. I was continuously facinated as I read highlighted passages from McCandless's books, grafitto, et al which Krakauer includes at the beginning of each chapter. All the research he has done is not just laid out flat, but revealed in a dialogue between him and the reader.

Others I've read remark McCandless as stupid, selfish, uninteresting, and a waste of a human life, suggesting stories by Jack London as a superior examination of human condition.

"McCandless [and other readers obviously] conveniently overlooked the fact that London himself had spent just a single winter in the North and that he'd died by his own hand on his California estate at the age of forty, a fatuous drunk, obese and pathetic, maintaining a sedentary existence that bore scant resemblance to the ideals he espoused in print" (44).

It is sad to know that such a life holds more respect than one man's passion to actually live out his beliefs as did McCandless.

As far as calling this man stupid and selfish, some readers happen to skim over the parts about his college education and donating [money] to OXFAM America, a charity dedicated to fighting hunger. I don't know where you live, but how many teenagers do you know who read War and Peace and spend the last of their money to buy hamburgers to give to the homeless while their peers are out partying?

McCandless may have been overly confident and stubborn to make his way on his own, but weren't his ideals real? Those who knew him speak of his true love of nature and high spirits. How anyone can claim he was wasting his life instead of living for the gain of material possesions is beyond me. McCandless reached his dream of living off the land and he did it for over 100 days, while others work their whole lives and feel empty, never knowing the real beauty of the world.

Krakauer tells of experiences with Alaskan hunters who claim that McCandless was wrong in thinking the animal he killed was a moose after examining the bones. "It was definitely a caribou...you'd have to be pretty stupid not to tell them apart" (177). Krakauer later found out that the animal was in fact a moose. Seems as though the natives are overly confident of themselves as well.

And had it not been for a bit of information left out in a refernce book of edible plants, McCandless may have survived.

The main thing that saddens me when I read reviews with low ratings is the hypocritical way the reader will toss off a man's life as not worth the pages in this book while complaining about McCandless wasting his own life. No one is trying to make this man out as a saint and judging his actions on your own ideas of success does not give your life more reason.

I'll end with a few quotes of the book that some may need to read over:

"McCandless wasn't some reckless slacker, adrift and confused, racked by existential despair. To the contrary: His life hummed with meaning and purpose. But the meaning he wrested from existence lay beyond the comfortable path: McCandless distrusted the value of things that came easily. He demanded much of himself-more, in the end, than he could deliver" (184).

"'Sure he screwed up' Roman answers, `but I admire what he was trying to do. Living completely off the land like that, month after month, is incredibly difficult. I've never done it. And I'd bet you that very few, if any, of the people who call McCandless incompetent have ever done it either, not for more than a week or two. Living in the interior bush for an extended period, subsisting on nothing but what you hunt and gather-most people have no idea how hard that actually is. And McCandless almost pulled it off'" (185).