Character Study

Christopher McCandless

"'You could tell right away that Alex was intelligent,' Westerberg reflects...'He read a lot. He used a lot of big words. I think maybe part of what got him into trouble was that he did too much thinking. Sometimes he tried too hard to make sense of the world, to figure out why people were bad to each other so often. A couple of times I tried to tell him it was a mistake to get too deep into that kind of stuff, but Alex got stuck on things. He always had to know the absolute right answer before he could go on to the next thing'" (18).

McCandless is an intelligent, extremely intense young man with a streak of stubborn idealism. He grows up in a wealthy suburb of Washington, D.C., where he succeeds both academically and athletically and graduates from Emory University. After graduating, he gives all of his savings to charity, goes by the name of "Alexander Supertramp," abandons most of his possessions, and spends two years hitchhiking and traveling around the western United States. He then hitchhikes to Alaska, where he walks alone in the wilderness north of Mt. McKinley. He is found dead in September 1992.

Carine McCandless

"Chris and Carine...[had] been best friends from an early age, spending hours together building forts out of cushions and blankets in their Annandale living room. 'He was always really nice to me,' Carine says, 'and extremely protective. He'd hold my hand when we walked down the street'" (80).

Carine is McCandless's younger sister, with whom he has an extremely close relationship and is the only family member that her brother is able to share his feeling with. Carine looks a lot like her older brother, and is also energetic, self-assured, opinionated, and a high-achiever. But unlike McCandless, she is very gregarious, forgiving of people’s faults, and fits happily into capitalist society.

McCandless remains in contact with Carine while he is at college and during his Westward journeys. The two share angry words about their parents, though Carine tells Krakauer that she has a much better relationship with her parents now having forgiven them.

Walt McCandless

"'The fragility of crystal is not a weakness but a fineness. My parents understood that fine crystal glass had to be cared for or may be shattered. But when it came to my brother, they didn’t seem to know or care that their course of their secret action brought the kind of devastation that could cut them. Their fraudulent marriage and our father’s denial of his other son was for Chris a murder of every day’s truth. He felt his whole life turned like a river suddenly reversing the direction of its flow. Suddenly running uphill. These revelations struck at the core of Chris’s sense of identity. They made his entire childhood seem like fiction. Chris never told them he knew and made me promise silence as well.'"

McCandless’s father is an aerospace engineer and the father of eight children from two marriages. He is taciturn, passionate, and stubborn. Much like his son, he is also brilliant, musically gifted, and temperamental.

Walt becomes the root of Krakauer’s theories on why McCandless ran off as he did. Walt himself is wealthy, self-made through hard work and education. He fathered five children with his first wife, Marcia, and later Chris Chris and Carine with Billie, his second wife.

For much of his life, Walt holds his son to very high expectations, which Chris attempts to live up to. During a fight between his parents, he overhears that his father was still married to Marcia for seven years while with Billie, attempting to maintain a home with both women. The two women discover what he’s done when Chris is only two years old, forcing Walt and Billie to move. It takes four more years before Walt divorces Marcia and marries Billie, and their children remember frequent fighting.

McCandless is angered by the hypocrisy of his father’s expectations. After five years of dwelling on his anger, he decides that he can no longer stand the duplicity of humanity and disappears, attempting to teach his parents a lesson as well.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KBtHiRRzgLU

Jan Burres & Bob

"'I have a son about the same age as Alex was, and we've been estranged for a few years now. So I said to Bob, 'Man, we got to take this kid with us. You need to school him about some things''" (25).

Jan and Bob are a middle-aged, itinerant couple who meet McCandless in the summer of 1990 when he is searching for edible berries alongside U.S. Highway 101. The two travel around the West selling knick-knacks at flea markets. Estranged from her own son, Jan takes a special interest in McCandless. They become close, and he stays in written contact with her until submerging into the Alaskan wilderness.

Jan and Bob take care of McCandless, attempting to nurture his desire to live free of society, but also warn him of the dangers of his actions. Jan tries to convince him he is making a mistake and to send him back to his mother, though she fails. Although frustrated by him, she also finds him intriguing and decides that he will eventually grow out of his youthful afflictions. As a motherly figure in his life, Burres is a key individual in his journey.

Wayne Westerberg

"Westerberg, a hyperkinetic man with thick shoulders and a black goatee, owns a grain elevator in Carthage...In the fall of 1990...On the afternoon of September 10...he pulled over for a hitchhiker, an amiable kid who said his name was Alex McCandless. There was something arresting about the youngster's eyes...[they] conveyed a vulnerability that made Westerberg want to take the kid under his wing."

Westerberg picks up McCandless when he is hitchhiking in Montana in the fall of 1990. He offers him a job at his grain elevator in Carthage, South Dakota, and the two become close friends during McCandless's stay.

After McCandless runs from his father and severs ties with his family, Westerberg becomes a close friend and father figure. Because he does not judge McCandless, he acts an inspiration to him. He represents the middle class and the opposite of everything that McCandless's father represents. McCandless revels in their deep friendship, but doesn't stay in Carthage long enough to really get to know him, instead choosing to wandering off whenever he gets the chance.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQsKXiSCqDI

Ronald Franz

"One can only speculate about why Franz became so attached to McCandless so quickly, but the affection he felt was genuine, intense, and unalloyed. Franz has been living in a solitary existence for many years. He had no family and few friends. A disciplined, self-reliant man, he got along remarkably well despite his age and solitude. When McCandless came into his world, however, the boy undermined the old man's meticulously constructed defenses. Franz relished being with McCandless, but their burgeoning friendship also reminded him how lonely he'd been. The boy unmasked the gaping void in Franz's life even as he helped fill it. When McCandless departed as suddenly as he'd arrived, Franz found himself deeply and unexpectedly hurt" (45).

Ronald Franz is an eighty-year-old widower, devout Christian, and veteran who picks McCandless up hitchhiking and takes a strong liking to him. His son and wife passed away long ago while he was away in Japan for the military, leaving him an empty man. Because of his grief, Franz becomes a kind, yet lost soul trying to find meaning in life. He adopts many Okinawan orphans, sending two of them to medical school. When he meets McCandless, he immediately feels the desire to offer his advice. He feels a powerful, fatherly affection for McCandless, and offers to adopt him.

Ultimately, Franz becomes a foil for McCandless by showing him that if he does not change his ways he will grow old and lonely. When Franz learns of McCandless's death, he starts to drink and renounces his belief in God. In the end, Franz is alone, on the road, and hoping for death.