Books : Into the Wild
Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 917.98045
EAN: 9780783883342
Format: Large Print
ISBN: 078388334X
Label: G. K. Hall & Company
Manufacturer: G. K. Hall & Company
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 315
Publication Date: 1997-12
Publisher: G. K. Hall & Company
Sales Rank: 1874337
Studio: G. K. Hall & Company
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Editorial Review:
Product Description:
NonfictionLarge Print Edition* A New York Times BestsellerIn April 1992, a young man from a well-to-do family hitchhiked to Alaska and walked alone into the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. He had given $25,000 in savings to a charity, abandoned his car and most of his possessions, burned all the cash in his wallet and invented a life for himself. Four months later, his decomposed body was found by a moose hunter. Jon Krakauer brings Chris McCandlesss uncompromising pilgrimage out of the shadows and illuminates it with meaning in this mesmerizing and heartbreaking tour de force.
Amazon.com Review:
"God, he was a smart kid..." So why did Christopher McCandless trade a bright future--a college education, material comfort, uncommon ability and charm--for death by starvation in an abandoned bus in the woods of Alaska? This is the question that Jon Krakauer's book tries to answer. While it doesn't—cannot—answer the question with certainty, Into the Wild does shed considerable light along the way. Not only about McCandless's "Alaskan odyssey," but also the forces that drive people to drop out of society and test themselves in other ways. Krakauer quotes Wallace Stegner's writing on a young man who similarly disappeared in the Utah desert in the 1930s: "At 18, in a dream, he saw himself ... wandering through the romantic waste places of the world. No man with any of the juices of boyhood in him has forgotten those dreams." Into the Wild shows that McCandless, while extreme, was hardly unique; the author makes the hermit into one of us, something McCandless himself could never pull off. By book's end, McCandless isn't merely a newspaper clipping, but a sympathetic, oddly magnetic personality. Whether he was "a courageous idealist, or a reckless idiot," you won't soon forget Christopher McCandless.
Average Rating: 
Rating:  -
An intriguing and thought provoking read. This book is more than just a biography or epilogue on the life of Chris McCandless. The author does a great job of tracing the last 2 years of McCandless' life while also setting other examples of man vs. wild at counterpoint.
Writing Style
Krakauer has a fabulous eye for detail, a great vocabulary, and his writing shows an intense passion for the outdoors. The descriptions of places, people and events were so vivid and engrossing that I feel as though I have a personal familiarity with many of the locations and events portrayed in the novel.
Even though Krakauer obviously has some of his own opinions and thoughts about the events, he did a fairly good job of presenting the work without too much intrusion of authorial bias. Actually, I felt that having Krakauer as author and narrator actually brought more to the story through his personal insights and bias. If the story was truly told by an absolutely non-biased author or by an author less passionately involved in the wilderness, I believe a lot would have been lost.
I also really enjoyed the use of quotations at the beginning of each chapter. Some of the quotations were pulled from passages found with McCandless while others were likely researched and input by Krakauer to add emphasis to his narrative.
Voice & Narrative
Krakauer's narrative voice was subtle and accessible and provided an excellent unobtrusive narrator ... Read More
Rating:  -
I feel the same as one of the other reviewers; why summarize the story on the cover and tell me what happens?
I couldn't get to the end of this book, to be honest, I couldn't even read past page 55ish. I tried, I kept reading as much as I could and as far as I could, but this book isn't worth my time.
I will not finish the book regardless of how strongly I feel about finishing everything I start. And, I would never recommend this book to anyone.
Rating:  -
This is not normally the type of book I read,but I am so glad I did.It's moving, and amazing. The story being recounted is quite interesting. (Later I saw the movie which seems very true to the novel, but is far more boring and slow moving than the novel- although the casting seems perfect.) Kraukauer is a beautiful story teller and lets you see the full character (smart but stupid, selfish but loving) boy who only wants to "walk into the wild" You can tell he loves him, but also wants to tell the truth. He is sensitive to those left behind and wants to depict Supertramp's final adventure as he might want it told himself. The book is interesting, and will make you sad, angry, and annoyed. It will remind you of the differences in humans, and how some people can be lost even unto themselves. The book pieces together fragments of the final months, year of Supertramps life to build a story of who this person was up to the tragic end.
Rating: -
It's ok to be a dreamer. It's ok to want to 'find yourself.' It's really ok to hike and backpack. I've done it myself, but I would never, never enter a wilderness area without, at least, a topographical map. Chris McCandless' story is nothing short of tragic.
Jon Krakauer does a fine job of getting you into the mind of this doomed traveler while also taking you into the adventure and beauty of the wilderness.
Rating: -
I'm saddened to see so many people writing with little or no compassion for Chris McCandless, and such a limited effort to understand his quest.
Most of us know what he was running from -- problems at home, a society struggling with issues of materialism and morality. But an understanding of what he was searching for -- inner peace, closeness with nature, a quiet and beautiful place in which to think -- eludes many of us, just as it eluded him.
It could be lovely, could it not? Wild strawberries spilling down the riverbank, red poppies flaming the hills, cobalt mountains loping along the sky, like waves in a gently rolling sea. I am blessed to live in such a place, where I can reflect and write in perfect solitude, and I appreciate the beautiful life I have. I live a little like he did, but without his extraordinary deprivation -- the berries, the bag of rice, no way (as he perceived it at that time) to get out.
Jon Krakauer mined this tragedy for the beauty, the goodness, and the hope that could be found in it -- and this bounty was rich! -- and I applaud his book and his wonderful writing, as I applaud the deeply moving film Sean Penn waited so patiently, for ten years, to create.
I agree with some of the points other reviewers have made -- that the particular venture Chris McCandless chose was ill-advised, that he had not adequately prepared for it, and that his family need not have been abandoned and left in the dark. ... Read More
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