First
history Spring, 1990. After graduating from Emory University (Atlanta), Chris McCandless left his home in his old Datsun 82. Not coming any more. Its aim is to travel America. And it will, with varying degrees of success, from south to north, reaching Alaska.
In their journey, lead a nomadic life. Broken relationships with his family, except his sister, Carine, with whom he will communicate. Renamed, will be renamed Alex Supertramp. Hitchhiking, dozing in the open on the outskirts of large cities, train collisions, precarious jobs, little food ... and friends on the road to help and those who find a kind of understanding that his family never found. But nowhere is it enough to call home. Its aim is different: to reach Alaska and fulfill his dream.
Two years later, in April 1992, Chris / Alex enters Alaska, poorly equipped, with very poor media. A synthetic parka, a pair of waterproof boots, a Remington rifle, a bag of five kilos of rice, two sandwiches, a bag of corn chips, an outdated map, a compass and books, a lot of books that will become your single company. Cree will not need more. Intend to live, survive, what lands give Alaska, hunting and gathering edible fruits and berries.
Life will show you a cruel way how wrong I was. Two months later, five hikers found his body in his own sleeping bag in an abandoned bus that he was home improvised. A body consumed by hunger and barely weighed thirty kilos.
At his death, there were many voices who spoke about him. Some accused him of crazy, reckless, unconscious, little more than enlightened. Krakauer himself was heavily criticized for glorifying his figure in the Outside magazine article in its January 93, the starting point of this novel. In contrast, others saw it as the ultimate romantic, like a monk proclaimed messianic, anyone who would listen, that another life if that was possible.
A life away from society, unaware of its rules and conventions. A life away from modern life, no security, no welfare, without their way of life, as tech and oppressive at the same time.
In a letter to one of these friends of the road, an eighty-year-old retiree who curiously changed life itself, it is quite clear.
(...) Be bold. Too many people are unhappy and do not take the initiative to change their situation because they have been conditioned to accept a life split based on stability, convention and conformity. It may seem that everything that gives us serenity, but in reality nothing is more damaging to the adventurous spirit of man that the idea of \u200b\u200ba stable future. The core of the human soul is the passion for adventure. Bliss of living comes from our encounters with new experiences and hence there is no greater joy than living with a constantly changing horizon, the sun is new and different every day (...) Do not throw roots, not you settle. Change location often leads a nomadic life, renewed every day your expectations (...) You're wrong if you think that happiness comes only or mostly of human relationships. God has placed everywhere. Is in each and every one of the things we can experience. We just have to be brave, rebel against our habitual lifestyle and begin to live outside the conventions (...) I hope that next time I see you're a new man and have accumulated a wealth of experience and adventure. Do not think twice. Do not try to find justifications for postponing. Just go out and do it. It's that simple. You will feel a great joy for having embarked on a new path (...) After
legend. About
McCandless has been said and written, but it is also true that his life is a mystery. Why this be so extreme? Why not try to help? Why stay on the bus while he was dying of hunger? Their motives, their aspirations, what he wanted, his life after this adventure ... it took him.
In this sense, the book by Jon Krakauer is an attempt to rebuild his footsteps, trying to shed some light on passages less documented. To this mixture the story of his adventures with letters, with his brief diary written in third person in the last leaves of a plant guide, with passages underlined in the books he brought with him and, above all, with the testimonies of those friends left the road and family members who seemed almost a stranger.
Without doubt, the figure of Chris McCandless is controversial, maligned and glorified equally. But I think we should acknowledge that despite his apparent folly, had the courage to live by as I thought and that although the consequences were tragic, was able to spread their message, it eternal and global, in a story, its own history, so particular and tragic, that manages to touch and stir consciences.
was able to make us see that there is another way of living, at a time when we all do the same, we are going to the same places, like sheep.
All this cocktail served also to Sean Penn to direct his fourth film Into the Wild ', 2007, and starring Emile Hirsch. Quite a critical and commercial success that brought the figure of McCandless to the general public and became almost a legend.
Into the Wild Jon Krakauer
Barcelona: Ediciones B, 2009. Zeta
Pocket, 139. 188 p.
ISBN: 84-96778-74-0
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