...friends warned McCandless “living in the bush ain’t no picnic,” and critics thought he was ill prepared and just out for an adventure he knew nothing about, Jon Krakauer thought differently. After spending an extensive amount of time trying to back track everywhere McCandless had been within the last couple of years of his life Krakauer showed great devotion and dedication to letting the world know McCandless’s story. Krakauer primarily uses McCandless’s journal entries, photographs, and books to try to gain a deeper understanding of the young man. I find it amazing Krakauer being a journalist in Alaska would not go directly to the site where McCandless died but, traveled all over the country to find out who this individual was and his purpose or meaning for going to Alaska. Krakauer found McCandless to be a riveting and intellectual human being. However misunderstood McCandless was Krakauer, wanted to prove that McCandless was important and not crazy. In Krakauer’s book there are some chapters dedicated to men with similar stories to McCandless such as Everett Ruess, an artist and wanderer who went missing in Utah, who did similar things and had a similar background as McCandless. Krakauer defends McCandless by comparing his personalities to Jack London, Leo Tolstoy, and Henry David Thoreau as well as himself recounting being a young man with his own Alaskan adventure on Devil’s Thumb. The people Krakauer encountered while back tracking McCandless were all impacted...
Words: 979 - Pages: 4