Mccandless Take Risks In Into The Wild, By Jon Krakauer

Mya, an American singer/songwriter, said, “‘Damage’ is about taking risks, stepping into new territory regardless of the outcome.” In the nonfiction book, Into the Wild, Jon Krakauer portrayed how a young man, Chris McCandless, freely lived his life. Out of his own confident and naïve conscious, Chris was on his own post-college without asking for or wanting assistance from family or friends. Having the possession of all this newly introduced freedom, Chris decided to embark on his long awaited journey to Alaska, living off of nothing but land. He was far from prepared, but didn’t care enough. Chris McCandless deliberately took risks.

Chris was deliberately taking a risk when he left his family to start his independent adventure with no money,

Chris moved out of his apartment in Atlanta, Georgia and hit the road, leaving his life behind to start a more ominous and adventurous one. The author wrote, “Five weeks earlier he’d loaded all his belongings into his little car and headed west without an itinerary,” (Krakauer 22). This shows that Chris went with the flow when he left. He traveled to different locations based on instinct and intuition. Chris took a huge risk by packing his stuff and traveling west because, if anything, he knew that danger was the one thing on his itinerary and could not be avoided. From the start of his freshman year in college to his final year in college, Chris had taken many trips when he was given a break between semesters, which left his parents worried. He wouldn’t ask for permission, he’d leave his parents a note mentioning where he was headed, after he already left. On one of his trips, he found out some ugly truths about his father’s divorce and the things he did with his marriages. Chris graduated with nearly perfect grades, and not too long after receiving his diploma, he took off with all the resentment he had in him. The author wrote, “Shortly thereafter, he donated the balance of his bank account to OXFAM, loaded up his

Krakauer portrayed the letter that Chris wrote to Burres while in Seattle. He had been living on the streets, now identifying himself as a “hobo” riding the rails. Chris was jumping trains without the thought of possibly getting caught and receiving consequences. A bull recognized his presence and was furious with Chris while kicking him off the train instead of firing his gun. Krakauer stated, “I got the last laugh when I caught the same train 5 minutes later and rode it all the way to Oakland” (53). This shows that all Chris had on his mind was a way of transportation. He had no thoughts about how many ways jumping trains could have gone wrong. Even after being caught, to take it a step further, Chris hopped on the same train he had been caught on. He knew there could be some sort of punishment for the disobedience and illegal actions he displayed, but didn’t think of it as anything more than a slap on the wrist; he deliberately took the risk of receiving consequences–possibly death– by breaking the rules twice in a row. Krakauer depicted how Chris traveled to the Stampede Trail from Carthage, South Dakota. After several hitchhiking attempts, he was finally able to get the attention of and catch a ride with Stuckey, a delivery man who was headed the same way Chris intended to go. Stuckey told him that he was unable to drive him the full distance, and Chris was unbothered by it and thankful for his