Effect of Romanticism

When I think of romanticism, I think of the true stories of Cheryl Strayed and Chris McCandless, two Americans in their 20's who, inspired by nature decide to go find themselves within it. Both of these real people are seen in their respective biographical books/movies to have an affinity for transcendentalist poets such as Henry David Thoreau and Emily Dickinson. Strayed and McCandless both use these poets as inspirations to escape the clutches of society. While Strayed's story has a happy ending as hiking on the Pacific Coast Trail helps her deal with her divorce and her mother's death, McCandless' story ends with him unable to return to society and dying along in a abandoned school bus. While Strayed's story tells the positives of nature as a healing force, McCandless' story is about the dangers of the over-romanticism of nature. Throughout the movie Into the Wild, McCandless focuses on escaping the oppressive clutches of society as well as a desfunctional family situation, he convinces himself that nature is his answer after reading transcendental poems but never stops to think that maybe nature will be his own undoing. Because of his exposure to the romanticism of nature, McCandless nevr considers that nature may be just as cruel as society and this cruelness ends up killing him.