Into the Wild Essay

Into the Wild Essay Chris McCandless stated that he wanted to “test his limits test my limits, I guess, to see what it's like to be hungry. I'm trying to put myself in an environment where nothing's spoon-fed.” However, he failed and died trying to achieve his dream of self sufficiency. Many people believe that he was a pilgrim, trekking for a cause through the United States, which is finding yourself and not just being a statistic in society. But Chris McCandless was none of things, but a selfish person. He gave up everything in his life to follow what he believed to be his calling, but in the process abandoned everyone who cared about him without so much as a goodbye. Although he believed he was doing the best thing for himself, he forgot that humans are social creatures and need other people to survive. Many of his actions, which many see as trailblazing, are what led him into the Alaskan wilderness and ultimately to his demise. Christopher McCandless was a selfish person who believed that he was better off wandering around and “finding” himself than staying with his family and being a productive and caring person to other people.

In the movie Into the Wild, Christopher was a very successful graduate from Emory University in Atlanta. After graduating there he talked with his parents about seeking a master’s degree from Harvard University, which is a testament to how smart he was and his aspirations to make something of himself in the future. However, during that same conversation, he tells his parents, who had just offered to buy him a brand new car, that his old one was just fine, and that he didn’t need a new car. This shows his distaste with looking like the average person in society and his affinity for being different. He tells them he wants to take 2 months off before starting his master’s degree to clean up some stuff but he probably meant that he was going to go away and take on a new name, “Alexander Supertramp” (Brown).

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