Into the Wild By Jon Krakauer

1. Into the WildBy Jon Krakauer

2. http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/videos/denali-national-park/http://channel.nationalgeographic.com/channel/videos/denali-national-park/

3. The Media • “Death of an Innocent” • 9,000-word article by Jon Krakauer appeared in Outside, Jan. 1993 • Into the Wild novel by Jon Krakauer published 1996 • “The Cult of Chris McCandless” • article by Matthew Power appeared in Men’s Journal, Sept. 2007 • Into the Wild film produced 2007 • Note: various other articles have been written in addition to television interviews and coverage.

4. The Media

5. Jon Krakauer • “Adventure” enthusiast • Experienced hiker, climber, and writer • Eiger Dreams • Into Thin Air • Under the Banner of Heaven • editor of the Modern Library Exploration series

6. Early Life • Born in 1954 • Grew up in Corvallis, Oregon • Father introduced him to mountaineering as an 8-year-old • So he was very passionate about the outdoors from a very young age. • Graduated from Hampshire College in 1976

7. Krakauer:Post-College • After college he traveled around Colorado, Alaska, & the Pacific Northwest • Worked primarily as a carpenter and commercial salmon fisherman • Spent all his free time outdoors

8. Devil’s Thumb ADVENTURES • 1977  Traveled alone to the remote Stikine Icecap in Southeast Alaska • Went three weeks without encountering another person • Climbed a new route on an intimidating peak called the Devil’s Thumb

9. ADVENTURES (cont.) • 1992  Climbed the West Face of Cerro Torre in the Patagonian Andes • A mile-high spike of granite, Cerro Torre was once considered the most difficult mountain on earth • May 1996  Climbed Mt. Everest • A snow storm hit during his team’s descent from the summit, killing 4 of his 5 teammates • Wrote Into Thin Air about his experience

10. Other Publications • Has been published in: • Outside • Rolling Stone • TIME • The New York Times • National Geographic • Many others… • #1 New York Times Bestseller • 1998 Pulitzer Prize

11. Chris McCandless • “Alexander Supertramp” • From an affluent suburb of Washington • D. C./well-to-do family • Emory University alumni (1990) • Two-year “odyssey” from 1990-1992 • Decomposed body found in bus (Stampede Trail, Alaska) in September 1992

13. American Transcendentalism “Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.”

14. Transcendentalism • A literary movement in the 1830’s that established a clear “American voice”. • Emerson first expressed his philosophy in his essay “Nature”. • A belief in a higher reality than that achieved by human reasoning. • Suggests that every individual is capable of discovering this higher truth through intuition.

15. Transcendentalism • Unlike Puritans, they saw humans and nature as possessing an innate goodness. “In the faces of men and women, I see God” -Walt Whitman • Opposed strictness of established religion.

16. Transcendentalism: The tenets: • Believed in living close to nature/importance of nature. Nature is the source of truth and inspiration. • Taught the dignity of manual labor • Advocated self-trust/ confidence • Valued individuality/non-conformity/free thought • Advocated self-reliance/ simplicity

17. The First Transcendentalists • Ralph Waldo Emerson “What I must do is all that concerns me, not what people think…” • Henry David Thoreau • “I went into the woods because I wished to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life and see if I could not learn what it has to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived.” • Margaret Fuller

18. “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music he hears, however measured or far away.”