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Into Thin Air In Jon Krakauer's Into Thin Air

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Jon Krakauer may not be loved or even respected by all but there is no denying he’s an adventurous man, courageous individual, and a brilliant writer. Jon Krakauer writes about climbing Mount Everest in his non-fiction memoir Into Thin Air in order to convey his message that the greatest fight in life is man vs. the natural world.
Jon Krakauer has had a very interesting life. He was born in Massachusetts and moved to Oregon (Hunter). A climber since 8, Krakauer’s life revolved around climbing (About). After graduating college, Krakauer spent his time as a fisherman and a carpenter to fund his climbing. When he decided to become a writer, he wrote for a multitude of websites and magazines before and during his time as a novelist. Although he …show more content…

Having already had writing skill, Krakauer was in the perfect position to write about the catastrophe. Into Thin Air is the story of Krakauer’s climb up Mount Everest and the disaster itself. The novel provides an hour-by-hour account of what happened out on Mount Everest that terrible day (Kakutani). It also provides Krakauer’s personal motivations in climbing Everest, a desire that he had as a child. Krakauer speaks to how no matter how hard you try to accomplish something, a force of nature could always get in your way. Climbing Everest is one of the most daunting adventures that anybody could hope to have. Fighting not only nature’s force but also your own body, trying to make the climb is simply not something that everyone can do. Many people gave the novel fantastic reviews, with Wilda Williams says that after reading the book, readers will be haunted by the story. Michiko Kakutani, Pulitzer Prize-winning critic, says that it is every bit as unnerving as Krakauer's first hit, Into The Wild. Although many people love it, others are more upset about it. Well known book critic, Dwight Garner claims that Krakauer got thing maliciously wrong when writing the story and had the leader of one of the groups on Everest that day, Anatoli Boukreev, support his story. Martin Adams, a member of one of the said groups, claims that Krakauer even changed …show more content…

Before even writing Into The Wild, Krakauer wrote an analysis of the Everest disaster that won him a National Magazine Award. Everest, his book about the big story, was widely acclaimed. It was not only the #1 New York Times Bestseller but also Time Book of the Year and a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize. In 1999, Jon Krakauer received one of the highest possible awards for a writer, an Academy Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters. The award was, “to honor writers of exceptional accomplishment,” a bill that Jon clearly fit.

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