Chapters 1-3

1. What was McCandless like? What kind of character did he have? Would
you have liked to know him?​
● McCandless was a very smart individual but he didn't conform to any rules or
structured practices. He enjoyed using his broad force instead of practicing his
structure in sports such as golf but he also enjoyed running or hiking.
2. Why did McCandless start calling himself Alex? Did this make a
difference in how he related to people?
● McCandless left his name behind as a symbol of leaving his conformity and so he
wouldn't be found then renamed himself Alex as he became a nonconformist of
society's rules and ventured out into the wild.
3. How would you characterize McCandless’s relationships with other
people: his parents, his sister, Westerberg?
● Chris had two different types of identities. One consisted as him being a product of
societal norms. Where he came from an upper-middle class family, went to the right
school, had friends and basically could’ve had a successful life in the matrix of a
market economy. Then there was the Chris who defected everything about being a
product of societal norm and became Alexander. Chris was pensive and aggravated
with people at his home beside his sister which was pretty much his best friend,
"Alex" was open to new ideas, friendships and deep social connections. Whether it
was Wayne Westerberg or the elderly Ronald Franz.

Chapters 4-7

4. In your notebook, list the people McCandless met along the way. What
was it about McCandless’s personality that made an impression on
people?
● The people McCandless met along his adventures was Wayne Westerberg, Jim
Gallie, Gaylord Stuckey, Jan Burres, and Ronald Franz. He was very smart and
charismatic, and was not your average man. He sought to find happiness in his
explorations which really surprised and intrigued people.
5. Note McCandless’s journal. Why do you think he avoided using the first
person when he talked about himself? Why doesn’t he use the pronoun
“I”?
● I’m pretty sure he avoided using his real name because it allows himself to look at
his experiences from an outsider’s point of view and gain perspective and also so his
parents wouldn’t be able to find him.
 6. Characterize Ronald Franz. What kind of a human being was he? Did he
have your sympathy? Why or why not?
● Franz was a warmhearted and caring man who tried to take on the role of Alex’s
authority figure even though he was running away from his real ones. Franz does
have my sympathy because he seems like a genuinely good person that didn’t
deserve to be lonely after losing his beloved family. I believe Alex seemed to have a
positive affect on his life even after he died.
7. What more did you learn about McCandless’s relationship with his
father? Do you think his anger is justified? Why or why not?
● I learned that his father had lied to their family by having an affair on his wife with his
ex wife then the family moved far away from the woman he had an affair with and
tried to practically forget and forgive the father's mistake which angered and hurt
McCandless. I do feel that his anger is justified because going through that pain then
being expected to act like none of it ever happened could be a lot to expect from
really any child.

Chapters 8–10: Outcasts, Idealists and Dreamers

8. Chapter 8 opens with some reactions from people to the article about
McCandless that Krakauer published in Outside Magazine. What do
most people think? Why did Krakauer put this material here in the
middle of the book?
● Krakauer explains that he received a lot of negative mail after the original article,
largely from Alaskans who thought McCandless didn’t respect the wilderness, and
believed he acted stupidly and stubbornly. There were a few others notorious in
Alaska for similar things. This section is also the first time Krakauer describes the
other famous and infamous characters to whom McCandless is now often compared.
Krakauer makes his own beliefs clear that though McCandless shares some
characteristics and behaviors with these men, the only one who is truly like him is
Everett Ruess. Carl McCunn was more naive, John Waterman was actually mentally
insane, but Everett Ruess was, like McCandless, simply deeply in love with the land,
very romantic, and passionate about living by his principles. These comparisons
show that removing oneself from society and living riskily can be a symptom of
insanity or stupidity, but it is not inherently so. This in turn emphasizes the need to
look deeply into something before passing judgment. Those who compare
McCandless to John Waterman, for example, are doing so based on a few parallels,
but a detailed study of either character very quickly shows that their motivations and
behaviors were very different indeed. This highlights the purpose of Into the Wild
itself, which is not just to tell an adventure story, but to study McCandless in the
 closest possible detail, so that is anyone is to pass judgment, it is at least with all the
necessary information.
9. Why did Krakauer interrupt the McCandless story with Chapters 8 and
9?
● It allows readers to gain a new perspective on why Chris acted the way he did.
10. Were you surprised that McCandless left trails so that the authorities
could find out who he was?
● Yes and no, I was a bit surprised because I knew that he did not want to be found
but also not surprised because although he was determined he may have needed
some support and also wanted to be known for the type of things he accomplished
or did to inspire others.
11. What’s in a name? Does it matter that we have the name we were given
by our parents? How do names matter? Does your name fit you? If not,
what name would you choose? Why?
● The significance of a name depends on the name holder. Some might think of it as a
word that they can respond to while others may believe it defines them as a person.
I, personally, do not believe that a name can determine who we are. My name
means “black, dark” which doesn’t have a necessary significance to me personally,
so I wouldn’t use that particular word to describe myself. Even though by definition I
wouldn’t characterize myself as a “Melony”, I do believe it suits me and I have grown
fond of the name.

Chapters 11–13: Family History:

12. What was McCandless like as a child and as a teen? What was he like as
an adult? Were there indications throughout his life as to the kind of
person he would become?
● At a young age Chris proved to be very intelligent and outgoing. He was very
ambitious and adventurous and as an adult still portrayed these qualities. These
traits transferred into the person he would become and things he would do as an
adult.
13. Do you think you are essentially the same person you were as a child?
How have you changed?
● I do believe I have a lot of the same character traits as a child. I believe that as I get
older I become a bit more wiser. I’ve learned to grow from my overall bad traits and
become a better person.
 ​Chapters 14-15

14. How does McCandless compare with the other wanderers Krakauer
describes? In what ways is McCandless similar? In what ways is he
different? Do we understand McCandless better after making these
comparisons?
● Like other wanderers, Mccandless had an inner contempt for what he saw as the
empty materialism of American society and this generated the desire to enter into
this adventure. But unlike some wanderers, Mccandless had a stabilized family that
was worried about him and loved him very much. It’s still a bit difficult to say if after
this comparison we can understand him and his thinking process better, it depends a
lot on the point of view of each person, some may think that he was crazy to leave
the people he loved and leave a comfortable life, others can agree to his attitude in
seeking peace of mind away from society and materialism.
15. Krakauer and others have speculated that McCandless was estranged
from his family because of his relationship with his father. What was his
family life like? Does it explain his later behavior?
● I don't think his family life fully explains his behaviour. Chris was very upset when he
found out his father was having an affair. Which helps explain his relationship with
his father but doesn't help explain his complete separation from his family. Chris was
still very close to his sister but even then the few postcards he sent her had
eventually came to an end.

16. Krakauer clearly feels a strong connection to McCandless. Do you think

they were very similar? Why or why not? In what ways is this book as
much about Krakauer as it is about McCandless?
● Krakauer's father forced his children to work harder and wanted Krakauer to attend
Harvard Medical school which influenced their relationship and more or less relate to
the concept of being a product of societal norms like McCandless but even though
they both tried to escape the invisible grasp of societies rules, McCandless was the
one that died trying to find peace within nature.

Chapters 16-17

17. After a long detour, Krakauer brings us back to the scene of

McCandless’s death. What does Krakauer discuss in these chapters
that he did not discuss in the previous chapters? Why did he delay
presenting this information?
● He informs us that McCandless isn’t gaining but he’s losing an alarming amount of
weight. He also talks about McCandless’s character development and how he wasn’t
able to preserve the moose he had hunted.
18. Krakauer provides a lot of quotations from McCandless’s journal in
these chapters. What is McCandless talking about? Why did Krakauer
include these selections?
● Chris is discovering just how hard it is to live in the wilderness. Chris knows he is
either going to survive or die. His thinking process becomes less about his beliefs
and more about survival. Chris also discovers what most readers knew from the
beginning, he needs company from other people. He begins to see the problem of
rejecting his family, especially his sister Carine. Chris becomes a dynamic character
a little too late. Krakauer included these sections to get us closer to Chris than we
had ever been before. Much of the book is seen through Krakauer's perspective of
Chris. In these chapters we get a glimpse of Chris’s mind set from his own words.
19. Krakauer quotes one of McCandless’s friends, who said that
McCandless “was born into the wrong century. He was looking for more
adventure and freedom than today’s society gives people” (174). Do you
think this is true?
● I believe that it is true that McCandless was looking for something more that his
societal privileged life could not give him. The problem does not necessarily begin
from the time McCandless was born but it arises from his childhood when dealing
with society and flaws from his father.

Chapters 18-Epilogue

20. What happened to Chris McCandless? What is Krakauer’s theory as to

how he died? Please write an objective summary.
● A young hitchhiker named Chistopher McCandless was embarking on a big
adventure to find something more than what society can offer and began his
venturing into the Alaskan wilderness but didn’t realize how completely over his head
he was. Chris was completely unprepared and mostly suffered from starvation.
Krakauer at first believed he was poisoned from a pea plant because it contained an
alkaloid but with later research he found that he could’ve been poisoned from a
potato seed, then he believed that the mold from the plant was the reason and finally
he came to the conclusion that the potato seed is what killed him because of the
amino acids.