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Into The Wild Comparison Essay

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Both Henry David Throeau’s Walden and Jon Kraukauer’s Into the Wild speak of entering a solitary existence in order to find peace and tranquility in their own personal worlds.
Thoreau wrote about his visit at Walden pond, whereas Kraukauer related his text to the nonfiction story of Chris McCandless’ journey into the wild Alaskan terrain. Besides the similarities, both McCandless and Thoreau had different approaches in their own pursuit of life alone that would later determine their separate fates.
In everyone’s life, there will be a point in which we feel a sudden urge to just get away.
We come to realize that there could be more than just the materialistic things. We come to wonder the meaning behind everything. In Henry David Throeau’s Walden, …show more content…
McCandless on the other hand, was not. He hitchhiked his way and only brought along a bag of rice with a gun. The only shelter he had was an abandoned bus that he used as a hideout. Another difference is the fact that Thoreau was not secretive about people knowing where he was. He often had visitors and people coming to see how he was doing. McCandless on the other hand, only wrote a handful of times to people he met along his journey and not even his family knew of his whereabouts until after his death.
Death is another major difference between these men. Thoreau lasted his journey while
McCandless passed away while attempting to live out his life.
These stories seem to mesh together well and these men both had similar adventures.
They both found a love of nature and solidarity. Both expressed this love of nature by leaving in search of it and both went to extreme depths to prove a point: you don’t have to have a materialistic world to be happy. They both spoke a real message to the world that society can change you, but living to your full potential doing what you love is the most important thing, even if you die

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