Five letters later, Knight broke off the correspondence, closing with, “Your friendly neighborhood Hermit, Christopher Knight.” Fascinated by a news item he spotted on his phone in his Montana home, he sent Knight a handwritten letter. If Knight’s withdrawal is inexplicable, Finkel’s connection to him pretty much matches that. “What I miss most in the woods is somewhere between quiet and solitude. In meeting Knight after his hermitage time ends, Finkel manages to pry powerful words from the man who may hold the world title for silent retreat. He reads stolen books, listens to stolen music and keeps to himself. Though he comes close to freezing and starving to death, he never gets sick, probably because there’s no one there to give him a cold or pass on the flu. He lives in his hidden camp through bug-infested springs, sweat-humid summers and bitter-cold winters. Knight steals a tent from one of those cabins, along with food and flashlights, and withdraws from the world. So thick are the bushes and brambles that surround it, even animals stay away. Though near a small lake’s summer cabins, it’s all but impossible to spot and even harder to penetrate. He walks, climbs, trips, falls and repeats until he finds a place he likes.

With no plan, no food, no outdoor gear, he leaves the keys in the car, gets out and starts walking.Īnd stops talking. He drives his new car farther and farther into the woods until it’s just about out of gas. Why? No reason he can articulate, then or 30 years later. At age 20, smart, self-reliant, shy Christopher Knight decides to give up on civilization and disappear into the vast Maine wilderness. And the hermit’s tale is as unlikely as the book’s success.

Stranger in the woods book