An Analysis Of Cheryl Strayed's Wild

Many people say that if someone has a bad rap sheet from their past then that person is unlikely to have a better future for themselves. For instance, in Cheryl Strayed’s book Wild, she reveals all the mistakes and hardships from her past: and in turn, she hikes through the Pacific Crest Trail in order to overcome them. She projects all the negative aspects in her life and throughout her journey she recalls back to them from time to time in order to mend the damage that she had brought upon herself. No one should be judged by their past. In some cases people change, but it’s who they are now that really matters. Strayed’s situation starts off with her explaining major events that have had a significant impact on her. She illustrates her mother’s passing of lung cancer and how it deeply affected her, as well as expressing the fact that her family fell apart afterwards. Strayed was much attached to her mother and had gone into deep depression because she couldn’t accept her mother’s passing. Strayed had mentioned, “It hadn't occurred to me that my mother would die” (20). She tried to keep in contact with her siblings and her
Strayed admits to having done drugs and lying to her husband; these are things that the audience can relate to in some form. She also reveals the source of her idea for hiking through the PCT by stating she had seen a traveler’s guide, The Pacific Coast Trail: Volume 1, while shopping for a shovel at a hardware store. Strayed has firsthand experience when it comes down to expressing the struggle of her mistakes as well as enduring the hike through the PCT. Before writing her biography, she had received and MFA in writing as well as publishing a novel. When she was having her book Wild published, she had simultaneously published a set of essays about her experiences from the