Into the Wild

Into the Wild

Write a 3-4 page essay on Into the Wild (11 or 12 font). Answer question one or two.

In the last paragraph of the author's note, Jon Krakauer writes: "Some readers admired the boy immensely for his courage and noble ideas; others fulminated that he was a reckless idiot, a wacko, a narcissist who perished out of arrogance and stupidity. . . ."

1. What are your convictions about Chris McCandless and why?

Optional considerations:

--Personal Narrative. In chapter fourteen and fifteen tilted identically--"The Stikine Ice Cap"--Krakauer tells us a haunting tale of climbing The Devil's Thumb in Alaska and about his fears of "living up to [his father's] worst expectations." In these two chapters, Krakauer offers the blunders and exaltations of his own "raw youth" to help clarify "the case of Chris McCandless." Do you have any personal experience that you can use as evidence to support you own convictions about McCandless?

-- Secondary Sources. Thoreau, Tolstoy, Jack London, etc. Consider the influence of literary texts on Chris McCandless. Research epigraphs online..

--Concessions and anticipating opposition to what you say: Regardless of your convictions about McCandless, somewhere in the essay, carefully consider the rationale of alternative perspectives. Show the reader--at some point--that you have considered other points of view. Argue your particular perspective.

2. Consider gender and ethnicity. How might this quest into the wild be different for women or people of color? Argue if the quest would even be possible or not, focusing on the cultural reasons why the journey "into the wild" is defined by race and gender. Use secondary sources and anticipate objections.

Criteria for evaluation:

I will ask myself the following questions when grading your essay:

1. Does the paper have a thesis. I am primarily looking for writing that is much more than a report. Does the student offer a perspective or is the student just giving information? (commonly referred to as a "data dump)
2. Does the perspective address an appropriate question or problem?
3. Is the paper free from long stretches of quotations and summaries that exist only for their own sakes and remain unanalyzed?
4. Can the writer produce complete sentences?
5. Is the paper free from basic grammatical errors?

If the answer to any of these questions is "no," I give the paper some kind of "C." If the answer to most of the questions is "no," its grade will be even lower. For papers which have emerged unscathed thus far, I add the following questions.

6. How thoughtful is the paper? Does it show real originality?
7. How adequate is the thesis? Does it respond to its question or problem in a full and interesting way? Does it have an appropriate degree of complexity.
8. How well organized is the paper? Does it stick to the point? Does every paragraph contain a clear topic sentence? If not, is some other kind of organizing principle at work? Are the transitions well made? Does it have a real conclusion, not simply a stopping place?
9. Is the style efficient, not wordy or unclear?
10. Above all, can I hear a lively intelligent interesting human voice speaking to me (or to an audience) as I read the paper?

Depending on the answers to such questions, I give the paper some kind of A or some kind of B.