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How does McCandless in Into the Wild mirror the protagonist of "To Build a Fire"?
Quick answer:
McCandless in Into the Wild mirrors the protagonist of "To Build a Fire" through their tragic fates at the hands of nature. Both men, overconfident in their abilities, ignore warnings about the dangers they face. McCandless dismisses advice about his inadequate gear for Alaska, while the man in "To Build a Fire" disregards warnings about traveling alone in extreme cold. Ultimately, both meet lonely deaths due to their underestimation of nature's power.
To be completely blunt, McCandless and the man from "To Build a Fire" are similar in the fact they both wind up being killed by nature's unforgiving attitude. The man dies of exposure and hypothermia, and McCandless dies from starvation and exposure. Both men feel that they are completely equipped for the adventure that is ahead of them, and both men are woefully wrong. The man is warned by the old timer to not go out in such cold weather, and the man ignores the advice. Late in the story, readers will see that the man realized his mistake about the old man's advice.
The old man on Sulphur Creek was right, he thought in the moment of controlled despair that followed. After 50 below zero, a man should travel with a companion. He beat his hands, but failed to produce any feeling in them.
Likewise, Jim Gallien...
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tries to tell McCandless that his gear is pitiful and isn't going to make it out in the Alaskan wilderness. Gallien even offers to take McCandless into town in order to buy better gear for McCandless. McCandless won't be convinced. His current gear was good enough before, and he believes it's good enough now. Unfortunately, we never get to learn if McCandless ever admitted to himself that Gallien was right.
Gallien offered to drive Alex all the way to Anchorage, buy him some decent gear, and then drive him back to wherever he wanted to go.
“No, thanks anyway,” Alex replied, “I’ll be fine with what I’ve got.”
Both McCandless and the man are simply way too overconfident in their own abilities to handle anything that nature throws at them. Consequently, they are not prepared with the proper gear and supplies to hold off nature's relentless efforts to destroy them.
In a sense, McCandless shared antithetical views to London's dark naturalist themes. McCandless sought adventure in Alaska, but he also thought that he could prepare himself to beat the elements. London, on the other hand, after enduring a severe "beating" by the Yukon's extreme environment focuses on man's inability to conquer nature or animals' instinct.
However, readers of both works cannot help but see the similarity between McCandless's lonely, harsh fate and "To Build a Fire's" protagonist's isolated death in the cold, unforgiving Yukon. Both men think that they will be different from others who have gone before them into the demanding elements of the north and met cruel deaths. Chris does not listen to all those who worry about him and advise him not to go alone to Alaska. Likewise, the newcomer ignores the oldtimer's advice about not traveling alone when the temperatures drop so low. In the end, both men die because nature defeats them--Chris is defeated by the cold and starvation, and the newcomer dies from hypothermia. Both are alone in the end.