Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer tells the story of a young man who abandons the traditional ways of modern day life to pursue a life free of material possessions and modern day cultural ideology. This young man's name was Christopher Johnson McCandless, and the story of his life is encompassed in Krakauer's novel down to a T. Christopher McCandless (AKA Alex McCandless) graduated from college in Atlanta Georgia and decided to rid himself of all of his money and possessions and head west to begin his exploration and search for meaning. Jon Krakauer does an excellent job depicting McCandless's life and shows us day by day what was going on in the mind of Chris McCandless. The novel "Into the Wild" gives us an in depth look into McCandless's life, but we are also given a visual representation of his life by the Sean Penn film "Into the Wild." Krakauer and Penn both use many different artistic techniques to tell the story of this remarkable young man. It can be argued that certain techniques have a bigger impact than others, but we are instead going to focus on how each technique is used by each artist to tell the story of Chris McCandless.

Perhaps one of the most important and useful techniques that is used in this composition is Krakauer's use of autobiographical information. By using pieces of Chris McCandless's personal diary at certain points in the story, the reader is able to see firsthand the unique pattern of thought that occurred inside his mind. Along with the ability to follow the daily thought process he had, the reader is also given the opportunity to go through this epic journey one step at a time through the eyes of Alex McCandless. In many instances when reading a story such as this one we do not have the luxury of autobiographical information and are left to follow the assumptions and conclusions drawn by either the author or the conclusions we come up with ourselves, often times leading to a misinterpretation of the main character or the main message being conveyed by the story. To avoid that occurrence Jon Krakauer includes letters that were written to and from his family and friends as well as passages from McCandless's personal journal. On page 21 of Krakauer's novel we are given one of the first examples of autobiographical information. It is a letter written by McCandless that gives the reader a glimpse into his relationship with his sister, Carnie. Not only does the letter help establish the relationship he has with his sister but it also helps establish McCandless as a Character. The letter helps captivate many of the feelings he had towards his parents and their beliefs.

The letter expresses some deep emotion and possible resentment that Chris felt for his parents. For example part of the letter reads, "A car that has in all those thousands of miles not given me a single problem, a car that I will never trade in, a car that I am very strongly attached to- yet they ignore what I say and think I'd actually accept a new car from them!! I'm going to have to be real careful not to accept any gifts from them in the future because they will think they've bought my respect!"  (Krakauer page 21) By providing such personal information Krakauer is able to help the reader truly see firsthand who Chris McCandless is and allows the reader the opportunity to form their own conclusions concerning his life, his journey, and who he was as an individual. This technique helps the reader understand who he was as a person and see why he had such an astonishing impact on people of all races, gender, and ages.

Once again Krakauer's technique of providing personal autobiographical and biographical information aids the reader in understanding the interesting dynamic of McCandless and those that were a part of his life. On page 48 Krakauer includes a letter written by a man named Ronald A. Franz who was an 80 year old man who befriended McCandless on his journey. The letter was written to "Outside Magazine" (the magazine that covered the story of McCandless's death) in an attempt to find more information on how McCandless had passed. After he ends his letter and states his purpose, Franz wrote, "Please do not make these facts available to anybody until I know more about his death, for he was not just the common wayfarer. Please believe me." (Krakauer Pg. 48) This letter from Franz depicts the kind of relationships McCandless developed with people that he hardly knew. Krakauer includes these passages for the sole purpose of helping the reader develop a better understanding of the impact that McCandless had on the people who crossed his path. While using this technique Krakauer also uses a technique used by numerous writers, timing. 

Timing is an extremely useful and effective technique. For example, again on page 48 Krakauer follows the letter written by Franz by stating, " McCandless made an indelible impression on a number of people during the course of his hegira, most of whom spent only a few days in his company, a week or two at most." In combining these two techniques he is able to add emphasis to and personal support to certain events in the book and help give the reader a strategy for analyzing the text as the story continues. The use of these techniques creates a visible pattern as the book unfolds. Krakauer uses autobiographical information, follows with his own written text and then uses biographical information along with letters and other accounts of how McCandless's journey unfolded to help depict the story for the reader.

Krakauer's novel is perhaps the greatest possible medium used to tell the story of Chris McCandless, but director Sean Penn does an amazing job of using a variety of different film techniques to portray Chris McCandless as an individual and provide a visual representation of his adventure for the world to see. For starters Sean Penn was able to create a film that takes the audience through the majority of the events that take place while also using narration techniques to give the audience a wider perspective on what was going on in every aspect of McCandless's life. These narration techniques not only cover what was happening in the present tense but also provide flashbacks and flash-forwards to help educate the audience on how he got where he was in life and where he might end up when the story is through. For example during the first portion of the film just as McCandless began his trip into the wilderness, the narrator (Carnie, his younger sister) took the audience through a flashback and gave details on how McCandless's parents met, how their marriage functioned on a day to day basis, and why McCandless disliked his parents and their beliefs as much as he did. Flashbacks such as this one help us understand certain actions and feelings that defined McCandless and also help the audience to understand how his sister felt about the situation. These narration techniques serve to express more than one perspective at a time while also education the audience simultaneously.

As the film continues, during the scene where Penn depicts McCandless kayaking through the rapids heading south to Mexico, Carnie begins to narrate once more. In this scene McCandless felt free, empowered and one with nature as he smashed and soared his way through the untamed water ways. While this is taking place carnie begins narrating and speaks about how although she wished her brother was communicating with her, she knew that it must have meant that he was finally free and finally expressing the part of him that no one else could understand. Penn uses these narration techniques throughout the entire film just as krakauer uses narration techniques through the entire novel.  

Over the course of the novel we learn that McCandless has a passion for literary works by writers such as Jack London, Leo Tolstoy, and Henry David Thoreau. All writers of the romantic variety who wrote stories about their love of nature. Krakauer takes advantage of McCandless's passion for good literature and uses passages from various compositions as epigraphs to start each chapter. These epigraphs help set the tone for each chapter and on many occasions help explain the ideology that McCandless attempted to live his life by. On page fifteen, the start pf chapter three (Carthage) Krakauer uses a passage from Tolstoy's "Family Happiness" as an epigraph. The epigraph reads, "I wanted movement and not a calm existence, I wanted excitement and danger and the chance to sacrifice myself for my love. I felt on myself a superabundance of energy which found no outlet inn our quiet life." (Krakauer page 15) so often throughout the course of the book does Krakauer use statements just like this epigraph to describe the drive that lived in the mind of young McCandless. Using these epigraphs was a wonderful technique that help the reader understand where McCandless found the ideals that he admired so much.

Jon Krakauer and Sean Penn both use an abundance of techniques to tell the story of Christopher Johnson McCandless but perhaps the most effective technique that the both used was the use of autobiographical information. Without the information from McCandless's journal and without the availability of all of the letters and personal accounts of his friends the novel and the movie would not have been what they were. The story of Alex McCandless is one that will live on forever and it will continue to be one of the greatest examples of literary and film composition to date.
