Into The Wild Transcendentalism Analysis

Christopher McCandless, the protagonist of the movie Into the Wild sheds his identity and life behind in exchange for the life of Alexander Supertramp who lives by transcendentalist values and ideals. He as well as the people he meets adopt beliefs similar to transcendentalist philosophers Ralph Waldo Emerson and Henry David Thoreau. In Into the Wild both philosophers and Christopher believe that a man must live and think truly independent of himself, modest and in pursuit of knowledge. They also believe a man to become self-governing must familiarize themselves with solitude ,as solitude is the only medium that provides knowledge and allows a man to become self-actualized. At the very start of his journey Alexander realizes that to truly reap the benefits of life, a man must live in pursuit of knowledge and travel modestly without luxury or need for extraneous material possession. Before Alexander leaves his car in the Arizona desert he burns all of his money and abandons all of his superfluous …show more content…
While wandering with the eventual destination of the Alaskan wilderness he develops and abides by the principles of living with modesty and gratitude for all things life has to offer. Christopher, similar to other Transcendentalist writers believes that for one to achieve true liberation and to start carving out self identity, one must distance himself from the constricting hive mind that is modern society and immerse himself in nature and the solitude that coincides. Only with this isolation can a man form his own unique conclusions and live by them without the repression and consequences one would have in modern society. A man abides by his own laws and acts accordingly, a degenerate lacking identity exists unaware, blind and destined for