Chris McCandless’s Motivations in Living off the Land in Alaska

4.2 Chris McCandless’s Motivations in Living off the Land in Alaska

The novel Into the Wild tells about Chris McCandless’s struggles to live off the land in Alaska. To be persistent in living off the land in Alaska, Chris has some motivations. His motivations to be persistent in living off the land in Alaska are influenced by his needs. According to Maslow, human motivations are classified into hierarchy of human needs 35-46. It starts from the physiological needs, the safety needs, the love and belongingness needs, the esteem needs, and the self actualization needs. The lower level of needs should be at-least-partially satisfied before going to the higher level of human needs. There are two kinds of motivations. Worchel and Shebilske mention the two kinds of motivations, intrinsic motivations and extrinsic motivations 408. In this novel, Chris experiences both intrinsic and extrinsic motivations. Someone’s motivation might be influenced by the environment. Here are Christopher Johnson McCandless’s motivations to live off the land in Alaska.

4.2.1 Having Interpersonal Conflict with His Parents

According to Redman external conflict, psychologically called interpersonal conflict, means a struggle between the protagonist and an outside force. It happens when the character have to face the outside forces which are not similar to the character’s desire, belief or thinking. The different desire, belief or thinking will create a conflict between the character and people around him 363. Raven and Kruglanski see interpersonal conflict as tension between two or more social 35 PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI entities, such as: individual, groups, or larger organizations, which arise from incompatibility of actual or desired responses qtd. in Worchel and Cooper 460. Chris and his parents often get conflicts. It is because he often sees his father and mother are quarreling, blaming each other and threatening to get divorce. This horrible situation triggers him to go out from his house to have adventures that he loves. Both Chris’s parents are tightly wound, emotional, loath to give ground. Now and then the tension erupts in verbal sparring. In moments of anger, one or the other often threatens divorce 107. It’s somewhat surprising that Chris ceded to pressure from Walt and Billie about attending college when he refuse to listen to them about so many other things. 114 Chris hates facing the situation when his parents are quarreling. The conflicts among Chris and his parents make Chris’s safety and security needs come out. He is unable to feel stability in his house which triggers him to leave his house. Besides, Chris gets different belief or thinking with his father. He doesn’t like to be seen as a rich or high profile person. This conflict happens when his father buys Chris a new car. … He already had a perfectly good car; he insisted: a beloved 1982 Datsun B210, slightly dented but mechanically sound, with 128,000 miles on the odometer. “I can’t believe they’d try and buy me a car,” he later complained in a letter to Carine … 20-21 Chris has different opinion about his car. He thinks that his Datsun is perfect and meaningful to him. Therefore, he is not happy when his father wants to buy him a new car. The conflict between Chris’s parents about his parents’ willing to buy Chris a new car doesn’t make Chris feel comfortable when he is in his house. He would better go for camping or having road trips with his car. 36

4.2.2 Sharing His Love to the Nature and Others

Chris is motivated to live off the land in Alaska because of his love and belongingness needs. He loves the nature and gets excited to the wildlife. Therefore, he often chooses to spend his holidays on going out to have road trips for camping. He loves having some road trips and finds new friends during the trip. He feels comfortable and excited getting new friends. In addition, it makes him feel alive. He is disappointed with his parents who often quarreling each other and do not provide enough time for the family because they are so busy with their jobs. “Mom and Dad put in incredibly hours. When Chris and I woke up in the morning to go to school, they’d be in the office working. When we came home in the afternoon, they’d be in the office working. When we went to bed in the night, they’d be in the office working. They ran a real good business together and eventually started making bunches of money, but they worked all the time.” 107 Since Chris’s parents are so busy with their jobs, Chris can only spend the time with Carine all day long. He feels left by the people he loves as Maslow says that when someone feels left by the people he or she loves they experiences the love and belongingness needs 43. Thus, by having the road trip to Alaska and living off there make him enjoys his life. He can forget being left by his parents for a while. It is because he finds new friends which he can share the love to them. He cares about his new friends he gets during the trip to Alaska. It is seen from the letter that they receive from Chris. This proves that Chris is happy having new friends during the trip and wants to keep in touch with them. 37 Chris is a generous person. He is very eager to help people. Worchel and Shebilske say that the behaviour which is done by one’s eagerness is called intrinsic motivation 408. He is motivated to help people because he feels being meaningful for others if he can do something to them. Before going to Alaska, Chris donates all his money in his college fund to OXFAM America. He wants to share happiness to others. It represents that Chris loves sharing his love for others.The final years of his college education has been paid for with forty- thousand-dollar bequest left by a friend of the family’s; more than twenty four thousand dollars remains at the time of Chris’s graduation, money that his parents thought he intended to use for law school. What Walt, Billie, and Carine does not know when they fly down to Atlanta to attend Chris’s commencement–what nobody knows–was that he would shortly donate all the money in his college fund to OXFAM America, a charity dedicated to fighting hunger 20. Because of the love needs, Chris loves helping people so much. On the weekends, he often spends his money to buy food for the poor, brings home a vagrant, or chatting with pimps and hookers, and gives them suggestions that they can make their lives better. He does those activities because he does not get enough love and time from his parents because of his parents business. He does not want people gets hungry. He helps people without any expectation to get a reward. According to Maslow, human motivations are classified into hierarchy of human needs 35-46. Food and water is the basic needs of human and it is included in the physiological needs 35. This is the reason why Chris decides to donates his money to OXFAM America, which is dedicated to fighting hunger. 38

4.2.3 Showing His Ability as a Good Adventurer

Chris wants to live off the land because he wants to show his ability to stay in the wildlife by his own. He wants to prove that he could get through pass it without being alone in Alaska. He wants to have the long trip and adventure to Alaska. Being persistent at living off the land in Alaska is also influenced by his esteem needs. Going for camping and living near the wildlife has become his favorite things to do for Chris, and he thinks is capable to do it. According to Maslow, the satisfaction of self esteem needs leads to feelings of self confidence, worth, strength, capability, and adequacy of being useful and necessary in the world 45. Chris experiences it while doing his road trips and living attached to the nature. Chris’s success in doing his road trips before doing the trip to Alaska also influences him being so confident. Near the end of the trip before going to Alaska, Chris has got lost in the Mojave Desert and has nearly succumbed to dehydration. His parents are extremely alarmed when they hear about this brush disaster but they are unsure how to persuade Chris to exercise more caution in the future. “Chris was good at almost everything he ever tried,” Walt reflects, “which made him supremely confident. If you attempted to talk him out of something, he wouldn’t argue. He’d just nod politely and then do exactly what he wanted 118. He is confidently doing his trips to Alaska without any doubts. When he finds trouble, he builds his spirit in keep struggling to live off the land in Alaska. He also likes telling the story about his trips to the new friends he gets. 39 … “He used to sit here at the end of the bar and tell us these amazing stories of his travels. He could talk for hours. A lot of folks here in town got pretty attached to old Alex. … 16 His confidence can also be seen from the leather belt that he made which tells his trip to Alaska. An accomplished leatherworker, Franz teaches Alex the secrets of his craft; for his project McCandless produces a tooled leather belt, on which he creates an artful pictorial record of his wanderings. ALEX is inscribed at the belt left end; then the initials C.J.M for Christopher Johnson McCandless frame a skull and crossbones. Across the strip of cowhide one sees a rendering of a two-lane blacktop, a NO-TURN sign, a thunderstorm producing a flashflood that engulf a car, a hitchhiker’s thumb, an eagle the Sierra Nevada, salmon cavorting in the Pacific Ocean, the Pacific Coast Highway from Oregon to Washington, the Rocky Mountains, Montana wheat fields, a South Dakota rattle snake, Westerberg’s house in Carthage, the Colorado River, gale in the Gulf of California, a canoe beached beside a tent, Las Vegas, the initials T.C.D., Morro Bay, Astoria, and at the buckle end, finally, the letter N presumably representing north. Executed with remarkable skill and creativity, this belt astonishing as any artifact Chris McCandless left behind 53. On the belt, it pictures that Chris finds many troubles but there is a NO U- TURN sign. The NO U-TURN sign represents that he has big confidence to keep continuing his trip to Alaska. The belt that he makes by carving the pictures of his trip also shows that he wants to show his ability of being a master of his trip to Alaska. 40 PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI

4.2.4 Having New Experiences

In the new places, Chris can show that he is able to do many kinds of tasks and works. He works hard for Westerberg, carves leather with Franz, and works at McDonald. He wants to do something useful for others in new places with new people. The new places make him eager to know the surroundings and experience new things. … Alex struck me as much older than twenty four. Everything I said, he’d demand to know more about what I meant, about why I thought this way or that. He was hungry to learn about things. 68 He feels excited and challenged to live off the land in Alaska. Since he was a kid he often goes to new places for him. Chris comes to Alaska to live off the land. Instead, he gets many experiences and friends during his trip as well. That is why he ever gets lost in the Mojave Desert. He has planned to live alone in Alaska since he is young. He is influenced by the books he read about nature and its wildlife. His hunger of adventuring new places makes him persistent in keeping living off the land in Alaska.

4.2.5 Realizing His Dream of Wildlife

Chris is persistent in living off the land in Alaska because of his intrinsic motivation to realize his dream of wildlife. According to Worchel and Shebilske, the intrinsic motivation is done when people do actions which are derived from the enjoyment and satisfaction 408. He enjoys a lot doing the trip to Alaska and lives off there by himself. He wants to live in the peaceful place and does exactly he wants to do without any interfering of others in Alaska. He wants to be free in 41 PLAGIAT MERUPAKAN TINDAKAN TIDAK TERPUJI doing anything in Alaska. It is because he does not like being told by someone else. Since he is a kid, Chris is always interested in anything related to the nature and wildlife. He reads many books related to it. Thus, the books influence him much to live in the wilderness of the nature and form what his destination or goal. Mesmerized with London’s turgid portrayal of life in Alaska and the Yukon, McCandless read and reread The Call of the Wild, White Fang, “To Build a Fire,” “An Odyssey of the North,” “The Wit of Porportuk.” 45 He also admires his grandparents who lives attached to the nature and wildlife. Chris loves to go out for camping or having road trips. Alaska is the most valuable place for many adventurers. Many books Chris reads and rereads tells about the story of adventures in Alaska. In Alaska, there is also Mount McKinley, which becomes an icon place of American wilderness. Therefore, Chris is very motivated to live there. McCandless was candid by Stuckey about his intent to spend the summer alone, in the bush, living off the land. “He said it was something he’d wanted to do since he was little,” says Stuckey. 158 Chris is also motivated by his self actualization needs. Living off the land in Alaska is the great satisfaction for an adventurer and hitchhiker like Chris, thus he extremely wants to live off the land in Alaska. Maslow says, “What man can be. He must be. He must be true to his own nature 46.” It is synchronous with Chris’s interests and behaviours as an adventurer or hitchhiker. He does living near the wilderness of the nature well and he chooses to do it. He had a need test himself in ways, as he was fond of saying, “that mattered.” He possessed grand–some would say grandiose–spiritual ambitions. 181 42 From the statement above, it can be concluded that Chris McCandless is also obsessed with ambitions to live entirely off the country. By living off the land, he can satisfy his last need of his life. He is able to actualize the self actualization needs by doing the road trips. He can avoid having bad feelings, inferior, and powerlessness. In addition, the final destination of his interests and the goal is living off the country in Alaska alone. This is the reason why he is persistent in struggling living off the land in Alaska. 43

CHAPTER V CONCLUSIONS AND SUGGESTIONS