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Into the Wild

December 16, 2009
Book of the Day: Into the Wild, by Jon Krakauer
Grade: D
First published: 1996
1-word review: Peripatetic
10-word review: Not all who wander are lost, but Chris sure is.

Chris McCandless leaves civilization behind and roams the West. Sort of. He eventually finds his way to a remote corner of Alaska, where he starves to death. He embarks on this journey without money, wilderness training, much food, or many tools. He was a rich kid who grew up in the D.C. suburbs and graduated from college in Atlanta, at Emory. He became obsessed with stories about life away from civilization, especially the writings of Thoreau and Jack London. And he hated his parents with an intense passion, for reasons never made very clear in the book.

Why is it that the writings of Jon Krakauer always make me angry? Not just at the people he writes about, but more so at Krakauer himself. Maybe it's because he so frequently jumps to ridiculous conclusions, whose lack of logic he manages to gloss over with writerly tricks. Maybe it's because he so frequently has to remind us of the extensive research he does. Or maybe it's just the fact that he has to turn almost every story he writes into a story about himself, making himself the protagonist, at least for a while.

Krakauer insists that McCandless is not crazy, while inadvertently giving evidence to the contrary. McCandless is compulsive, obsessive, peripatetic, controlling, manipulative, charming, restless, paranoid. He has trouble with intimacy and a tendency to get lost in a fantasy world. He shows little real regard for the feelings of others. He is intensely self-centered. These are all common characteristics of various mental illnesses. Krakauer seems to think that McCandless can't be crazy because he reminds him so much of himself.

By the way, did you know that Idaho is not just the top producer of potatoes, but the top producer of lentils in the United States as well? What an amazing state!


Living in Idaho is certainly better than starving to death in Alaska.

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