Chris Mccandless 'Family Happiness' Analysis

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After being in the Alaskan wilderness by himself for over a month, Chris McCandless began to transform into a person that would be unrecognizable to everyone. McCandless had secretly started to abandon his ideologies about isolationism and instead started looking towards intimacy. While reading Tolstoy’s “Family Happiness,” McCandless highlighted a passage that said, “the only certain happiness in life is to live for others” (116). The author implies that true happiness can only be reached when a person decides to pursue a life worth living for the people they care about most. By highlighting the passage, McCandless obviously agrees with the statement written, which contradicts every standard that he set for himself. In the wild, McCandless was slowly …show more content…
Furthermore, McCandless goes beyond highlighting to write personal notes in the margins of the books he reads. Confirming his change in view, McCandless notes that “happiness [is] only real when shared” (129). This contradicts all of the solo journeys he has taken where he noted how much he enjoyed himself in his journal. McCandless recognizes that his entire journey was not built on happiness because it was missing a vital element: friends and family. The Alaskan odyssey suddenly seemed like a burden and he would have no one to share the experience with and some people would only experience it through second hand stories. McCandless began to want someone with him in the wild to share the experience with rather than being alone and isolated in the bus. Krakauer notes McCandless’s sudden switch in viewpoint to reveal the transforming powers that the wild had on McCandless. The author wants people to assume that McCandless had been changed for the better and he was ready to abandon his ridiculous isolationism and opt for the more appealing life of being with people he
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