Ignorance

" 'Alex, you're too early. There's still two foot, three foot of snow on the ground. There's nothing growing yet.' But his mind was pretty well made up." (Krakauer 159).

Inspiration or Fool?

This text is yet another example of Alex McCandless's ignorance. This man who picked him up is only trying to warn him but he obviously was not going to listen to him. His arrogance is revealed and his cockiness gets in the way of everything and everyone else. I believe Alex to be a fool because he went out of his way to ignore people who want the best for him. It does not even seem like he would listen at all. It is almost like everything people say to him just goes over his head and misses him completely.  It is rude and it puts a burden on others and I am sure those people felt guilty when he ended up dead.

Rebelious McCandless

"He'd explained at the beginning of the semester that because he had something like two hundred students, lab reports had to be written in a particular format to make grading them a manageable proposition. Chris thought it was a stupid rule and decided to ignore it. He did his lab reports, but not in the correct format, so the teacher gave him an F." (Krakauer 109).

Inspiration or Fool?

This excerpt reveals the nature of Chris McCandless. He refuses to play by anybody's rules. In some parts of the novel, Chris seems to be doing things in order to inspire but this seems like straight up rebellion to me. It says that he was aware of the rule that the teacher made, he just chose not to follow it because he never liked to be told what to do. It makes him seem selfish and bratty. He went out of his way to rebel against authority and it ended up with him failing the class. Now this one act did not matter very much in the grand scheme of things, but it exposed his true personality.

Freedom at Fairbanks

"'I even offered to buy him a plane ticket to Fairbanks, which would have let him work an extra ten days and still get to Alaska by the end of April, but he said, 'No, I want to hitch north. Flying would be cheating. It would wreck the whole trip.' '"

Inspiration or Fool?

Chris's choice to live independently is shown clearly in this excerpt. It is also clear that he does not play by the rules of society. He has his own way of thinking and people's input seem to mean nothing to him. Some might think of his detached persona as inspirational. It is true that he is courageous to throw away a life of safety to live the life he wanted to live. Most people are stuck being unhappy, but Chris seized every opportunity he could to be the man he wanted to be.  At the same time it would be easy to just call him an outcast; someone who had an unrealistic perspective on the world. I personally think it is inspirational. Although I'm not going to follow his footsteps and run away into the Alaskan wilderness, he does not fail to make me think real hard about how life is a journey.