Christopher McCandless

It 's not easy for me to write on this website because the story of Chris is really coming into my heart and...I cry every time I watch the movie, because I couldn't help him when he needed it...
Many people have not understood him or simply do not realize that it is wrong to judge him because he took personal decisions about his own life, he wanted only to be happy!

For me he was a great man, brave, sweet, a guy with a head full of dreams, like me, like you ... his death is the death of a brother away that I couldn't embrace, that I could not listen look in his eyes ot talk to, but even though, he left us a great message of love and freedom!

I often think about him, I would say many things but the words will be forgotten one day, before or after us, but the feelings that we have and the love that we create in our soul, it will remains forever!

Thank you CHRIS!!!

I just read the book, although I've known the story for a while. I posted some thoughts on it at my blog: http://www.acagle.net/ArchaeoBlog/?p=11693

My mind changed on what I thought of McCandless about a dozen times while reading. I eventually decided to just let it be.

Welcome. It never ceases to amaze me how this story strikes such a chord with so many others. I think partly because it is a classic tragedy in a modern setting. We can relate to Chris easily and so completely, his truth comes across as our truth. Not only do we feel for him but we feel with him and it seems that we knew him without ever having met. In a world so full of phony people we feel the loss of one so genuine, one so rare, and having only heard about him. For us who feel compelled to search out this rather obscure forum, there is a bit of Chris in each one of us.

Yeah, I think a lot of people look at him and think something along the lines of "There for but the grace of God go I". Odd, I've known about the story for years (the old TV show Millennium did an episode based on it -- a very good one -- and that was the first I'd heard about it) but never found the book. I was surprised at how much it's affected me; I was really sad at the end of the book and I'm not generally one for melancholy. That's where I think Krakauer is such a fine author; he manages to get across the noble and not-so-noble aspects of his subjects, but always with sympathy and acknowledgment that he, the subject, and the reader are human after all.

I also just realized this morning that McCandless and I weren't that far apart in age either, just six years. Yeesh.

bobenns wrote:Welcome. It never ceases to amaze me how this story strikes such a chord with so many others. I think partly because it is a classic tragedy in a modern setting. We can relate to Chris easily and so completely, his truth comes across as our truth. Not only do we feel for him but we feel with him and it seems that we knew him without ever having met. In a world so full of phony people we feel the loss of one so genuine, one so rare, and having only heard about him. For us who feel compelled to search out this rather obscure forum, there is a bit of Chris in each one of us.

Hi,
I don't believe I can add more because you wrote so well that your words are perfectly my thoughts. Fortunately I also read good things about Chris in this forum and people who write wonderful things as you, thanks.

acagle wrote:Yeah, I think a lot of people look at him and think something along the lines of "There for but the grace of God go I". Odd, I've known about the story for years (the old TV show Millennium did an episode based on it -- a very good one -- and that was the first I'd heard about it) but never found the book. I was surprised at how much it's affected me; I was really sad at the end of the book and I'm not generally one for melancholy. That's where I think Krakauer is such a fine author; he manages to get across the noble and not-so-noble aspects of his subjects, but always with sympathy and acknowledgment that he, the subject, and the reader are human after all.

I also just realized this morning that McCandless and I weren't that far apart in age either, just six years. Yeesh.

Hello, I respect your opinion, but maybe for me is a little different, because I arrived to my considerations of him watching the movie and then read the book and I are passionate about history of him. So I found in general information, photos, forums, etc. I tried to go beyond appearances, and I think the book written by Krakauer is not fully trusted. Although I liked the book and probably thanks to Krakuer that we know the story of Chris ...I tend to pull off, because it is just one of many pieces that make up the puzzle, but the truth about Chris is just a metaphor : only he could tell us the real story, his views, his true feelings. When I look at pictures of him I love his smile and when there are landscapes that chose to photograph I think he was simple and poetic “an Aesthete voyager whose home is the road”, an intellectual. Chris puts poetry into every gesture, even more trivial ... in front of the eyes of other people , not for me.