Selling Freedom
The wild aesthetic in the American imagination
Two years he walks the earth. No phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes. Ultimate freedom. An extremist. An aesthetic voyager whose home is the road. Escaped from Atlanta. Thou shalt not return, ‘cause “the West is the best.” And now after two rambling years comes the final and greatest adventure. The climactic battle to kill the false being within and victoriously conclude the spiritual pilgrimage. Ten days and nights of freight trains and hitchhiking bring him to the Great White North. No longer to be poisoned by civilization he flees, and walks alone upon the land to become lost in the wild.
Alexander Supertramp May 1992
It has just been over thirty years since this notebook scribble was originally written by a nonfictional character named Christopher McCandless (self-dubbed Alexander Supertramp), the tragic hero of Jon Krakauer’s non-fiction folk story Into the Wild. Pulled by the magnet of the American Occident, the Emory graduate fled his upper-middle-class, careerist fate in search of a liberating transcendentalist meaning. A self-proclaimed “aesthetic voyager,” he donated his savings, severed contact with his family, hopped in his yellow Datsun, and drove West. After a nomadic, years-long Odyssey consisting of hitchhiking, foraging for food, working odd jobs, and wandering through the natural world, he set his eyes on the wilds of the remote Alaskan backcountry. He spent the last four months of his life camping out in a teal and white abandoned shuttle bus, reading the bare essentials: Tolstoy, Thoreau, and a field guide for edible Alaskan flora to live off of the land. He starved to death just a few miles away from civilization. While it was not the climax that he had in mind, his story made that shuttle bus a site of pilgrimage for American outdoorsmen until the local sheriff grew tired of constantly rescuing backpacker-pilgrims. The bus was airlifted to the University of Alaska in 2020.
Even though the bus was moved indoors, McCandless’s story still nudges thousands of people towards the great outdoors. I am one of them. I first watched Sean Penn’s film adaptation of Into the Wild when I was twelve. Six years later, I moved west from suburban Minnesota to the University of Colorado to study English literature. Boulder, also currently the home of Krakauer, is the gateway to the Rockies. I first passed through Boulder on my way to Rocky Mountain National Park with my family when I was around nine years old. Facing a panorama of rock slab formations upon the mountains, the Flatirons, I took my first stroll down the Pearl Street Mall in awe of the natural scenery that every tourist and proud native is privileged to enjoy. When I took my eyes away from the backdrop, I noticed the gauntlet of outdoor gear stores that I was passing through. The Flatirons effectively served as a colossal advertising billboard for these businesses. Enchanted by my tour of the outdoorsy town, I ultimately decided to move there.
Out of Body, Out of Mind
The saying goes “seek and ye shall find.” For the most part, that rang true for me. I joined the ranks of out-of-state granola college students at CU. We wear Patagonia, listen to indie folk music, hike and/or ski on the weekends, watch mountaineering movies, eventually approach the curious thrills of rock climbing, and count the Subarus as we sit in the traffic on I-70. It’s kind of odd that people characterized by their individualistic impulses tend to fit into another mold or even subculture. I also enjoy trail running, a sub-categorical activity within the subculture. This past summer, I spent many mornings waking up at 2 a.m. to drive to the trailheads of the 14ers, approximately 14,000-foot high mountains, to run. I was a pretty lousy runner on my cross country team in high school, so I decided to slow down even more in order to move to higher ground. I lust for the endorphin-rich, primitive solitude of running through the sublimity that is burned through my closed eyelids: The trumpets of a fire-like alpenglow that announce the dawning sun, goose-flesh bathing in the icy waters of a private pond beneath the midday heat, squeaks of furry pikas hidden in the scree, sweat from my palms moistening the ridge-line, wildflowers waving in a serene daze, and brush-stroked sunsets painted upon wildfire smoke. It’s not an out-of-body experience; it’s an out-of-mind one. Seriously.
My proudest adventure was a trail run up Longs Peak, the closest and most iconic 14er from the perspective of Boulder and its thousands of tourists. It entails a seven-and-a-half-mile trek up to the top. The trail winds through tree-laden glades, gradually rises to a high-alpine meadow passing near the glacial, sky-blue Chasm Lake, and switch-backs to a massive boulder field upon which rests a thousand-foot tall, diamond-shaped cliff. The harder part of the ascent entails an upward-spiraling route of some moderately-exposed scrambling. I started early at three in the morning in a bid to beat the half-consciously anticipated crowds to the top. Steadily overtaking each headlamped point on the already thickening dotted line of lights in the darkness, I was still arrested by the virtual conga line of determined hikers by the time I reached the Keyhole, the arching gate to the scrambling section. I was excitedly nervous about the exposed Narrows, the scrambling on the edge of the Diamond cliff, but that thrill was never really realized; I had someone there to assure me for any scary move ahead. I exchanged stories with strangers, connected with them through encouragement and enthusiastic reassurance, and found agreement in shared “stoke.” I deeply appreciate how agreeable people are while they are doing something they love, though occasionally, I heard a murmur of complaint about the crowd (from a member of the crowd). I’ll admit, sometimes a claustrophobic, misanthropic thought would poke its head into my stream of consciousness: “The whole point of getting out here today is to get away from others, right? Then what am I doing in this line of people?”
On my drive back to Boulder, I felt accomplished, but I reflected that—to my own fault—my experience was far from the individualistic sublimity of my other solo adventures in the Colorado high country. My summiting of Longs Peak was no romance. There is no doubt in my mind that I enjoy hiking in the mountains with other people, but that activity does not scratch that certain itch for me. Instead of temporarily escaping society, I found myself waiting in a line full of people longer than the checkout line at the grocery store. Ever since I first thought of this distinction, I have not been able to stop thinking about it. What is this itch that outdoorsy loners suffer?
The Wild Aesthetic
For me, the itch is of the aesthetic kind, the wild aesthetic. It’s not just the natural beauty that gets me out there in the backcountry. There is a wild quality to these experiences. While performing something physically strenuous with few or no people around, working with the sheer basics of life, and being free from any sort of distraction from the present moment, there comes a relief. Like many others typically say, I feel free out there. I am the individual but not with an audience and necessitated self-consciousness. My willpower is at the helm of my attention, but I am aware of the greater forces of nature with which must be reckoned. The wild aesthetic is an ideal, and I believe that many individualistic people find themselves attracted to it, and some dedicate their lives to pursuing it. The aesthetic is also structured in a narrative composition. Experiences in pursuit of the expression of the wild aesthetic are expeditions and adventures—stories. They can be true or fictional, and I think that the latter rightly invites more suspicion and scrutiny.
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty is another film about escaping society in pursuit of outdoor wonder, but in contrast to Into the Wild, the narrative makes no claim to truth. Some criticize McCandless’s bold and brash, ultimate failure in his escapist, individualistic idealism. They perceive his doomed fate as some sort of a borderline-comical tragedy—comical in his foolishness, tragic in his lonesome, painful death. Ben Stiller, director and leading actor in Walter Mitty, riffs on a great deal of McCandless’s idealism. Walter Mitty lives a life of accidental monk-like asceticism. Every day, he wakes up (but not really), goes to the office, gawks at one of his coworkers, and hides away in the dimly lit negative assets department to develop photos for Life Magazine. To satiate his repressed adventurous spirit, he involuntarily slips into inspirational daydreams. Momentarily, he lives the life of a superhero, mountaineer, seducer, and aesthete. Through his subjective everyday experience, he lives a double life with one persona as a boring/bored loner and the other as the most interesting man in the world. On the other hand, everyone around him sees a melancholic dork who frequently dissociates. Inside his industrial habitat, he is closest to the aesthetic wonder of his photojournalist colleague Sean (Sean Penn again, that is). Having lost the front page photograph for the last physical publication of Life, Mitty is given his opportunity to live out his alter ego for longer than a fleeting glance in his imagination. The purpose of serving his employer justifies this adventure for himself, but he soon discovers the pleasure in escaping the 9 to 5 grind. He jumps off a helicopter into shark-infested water in Greenland, rides a longboard down mountain roads toward an erupting volcano in Iceland, and finally confronts Sean Penn in a Himalayan valley to experience the rare sight of a snow leopard. His correspondent from eHarmony, the online dating service and product placement, goads him on, updating his profile with these novel experiences and raking in his matches. I think that Walter Mitty is a widely misunderstood movie. Its lovers closely relate to the protagonist in idealizing the outdoor-adventure aesthetic; like Mitty, they dream of finding themselves in that itch-scratching escapist individualism. Its haters complain about the pervasiveness of its commercial name-dropping and product placement, shallow metaphors, and cliché. The earnest, feel-good tone of the movie is a mirage to both of these crowds.
I think my interpretation lies between the positive and negative regards: as this film has been correctly categorized on the internet, Walter Mitty is a comedy/satire not far off from the original comic strip it is based upon. As the Everyday Joe dreams up these ridiculous fantasies to cope with a banal lifestyle, even though his consciousness has left his disappointing environment, the environment really does not leave him. Mitty works for a publication that commodifies the aesthetic wonder of outdoorsy adventure, and even while he tries to run away from the office, he still searches for the transcendent photograph that his boss acquiescently cares about. Once he is fired for failing to do his job, he continues to follow his mission, apparently not for his corporate overlords, but for himself. Out of spite (or devotion to his company), he submits the cover photo, which cheesily ends up being a portrait of himself. Like a workaholic on vacation, he never truly escapes his life purpose of serving his employers. This is where I find the cynical layer hidden beneath the endearingly earnest tone. Whether he is dreaming of adventure or experiencing it, Mitty never escapes the mundanity of society; that is where the irony resides. It makes outdoor culture a commodity, merging commercialism with the wild aesthetic.
Adventure Without Work
Walter Mitty is just a fictionalized example of what the outdoor industry does by the way it sponsors outdoor athletes and pumps out documentaries. Whether it’s a ten minute YouTube video or a feature-length documentary, I get to experience some inkling of the aesthetic pleasures of an outdoor adventure without any of the suffering or work. I am grateful that many of these films are “free.” I pay almost nothing to consume the majority of these products. Sure, I watch the ads on YouTube. But even when I pay for the feature-length film that comes with no formal advertisement, I see a mall’s worth of brand logos. I can see Alex Honnold or Conrad Anker transcending the sport of climbing as they are decked out in The North Face apparel, La Sportiva footwear, Black Diamond gear, and whatever other products from a brand that invests in their performance-marketing. I don’t blame these athletes at all. They are the artists, and the brands are their patrons. In return for the Faustian compromise of promoting some companies, they get to do what they love as a profession (and of which I am admittedly envious). Many of these companies boast some effort toward making the world somewhat better, too. They gradually transition toward a sustainable model of industry, fund environmental charities, provide and recycle reliable gear to help people (like me) experience the outdoors safely, and they generally work to expand outdoor culture and make it more inclusive. These are all pros. One con that makes me cringe is the monetization of an aesthetic that perhaps at best should be kept at a respectful distance from society and industry. Maybe I’m being a bit snobbish and idealistic here, and I don’t have any better alternative models for how the outdoor industry should interact with outdoor culture (yet), but this is what we have right now (though crowd-funding from fans is slowly becoming more common, and charity sponsorships are another example). I think that Walter Mitty spoofs this relationship between commercial industry and the wild aesthetic pretty well, but as far as I can see, not many people get the joke. I think most of us are used to the paradox of a liberating, anti-materialistic ideal being paired with commercial branding; it’s too real to be satire. The wild aesthetic has been corrupted to the point of self-contradiction and vertigo concerning its regarding of and relationship to society, and I don’t hear many voices complaining. It appears to me that the “aesthetic voyager” of lore has become—in some contexts—a hunger artist, a noble savage at the zoo, a living, breathing ad.
In the face of outdoor culture, I am still disoriented. The itch still lingers, but I am unsure how to go about scratching it. As I work to navigate through the philosophies, the “why,” the attractive narratives and rhetoric, the greedy salesmen’s greasy traps, the shiny goalposts built upon papier-mâché foundations, and my own experiences within a hearth of the culture, I feel that I am far gone from the simple pleasures of my dead fantasy of McCandless’s wild aesthete. Everyone has different reasons for chasing the wild aesthetic and adventure, and I believe that any reason needs to be a really good one, as the lifestyle necessitates a great deal of risk. I would hate to follow in the pitfallen footsteps of either character, McCandless or Mitty.
Between the earnest, solipsistic idealism and deceptive materialistic cynicism, there must be a sublime sensibility. Though the wild aesthetic is vulnerable to being sold, it is through these poetic narratives, true and fictional, that the aesthetic is free to be reworked in our culture.