Post by Nation on Feb 23, 2005 13:35:40 GMT 1
On Monday, one of my all time heroes, the writer/journalist/originator of gonzo (not the muppet) Hunter S. Thompson died. He shot himself in the head after spending the last few years in poor health. He went out the same way as one of his heroes, Ernest Hemmingway.
Most people will know of H.S.T. for the film adaptation of his book "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" starring Johnny Depp as H.S.T's alter ego Raoul Duke (which Depp spent 7 months living with H.S.T. preparing for by learning his moves and habits) What a lot of people don't know is H.S.T. was a famed journalist in his own right. A main voice of dissatisfaction from America's underbelly commentating on the death of the American dream in the 1970s, he was one of the last americans to be evacuated from Saigon after America left Vietnam, as well as spending 1 year on the road with the Hell's Angels in their prime.
Originally "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" appeared as a two part news coverage story in Rolling Stone magazine. Hunter was sent to Las Vegas by the magazine to cover a race. Instead he spent all his expenses on drugs, booze, a candy apple red cadillac, pick up his lawyer, Oscar Acosta (the film/book's Dr Gonzo) and headed to Las Vegas in search of the American Dream. This is what he wrote about and the style of Gonzo was unleashed upon the world. The prime function of Gonzo is basically the writer becomes part of the story as it happens and in some cases makes it happen. The term is used nowadays not just in writing but also in music and even porn. All these can be traced back to Thompson's foundations.
Hunter once wrote of his friend Oscar Acosta: '[he] was one of God's own prototypes - a high powered mutant of some kind who was never even considered for mass production. He was too weird to live and too rare to die'. He could, I'm sure, have just as easily been writing about himself. There will be greater writers and there will be lesser writers, but there will never be another Hunter S. Thompson. It's only when you lose such a beautifully discordant note that you realise how much everything else sounds the same.
Most people will know of H.S.T. for the film adaptation of his book "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" starring Johnny Depp as H.S.T's alter ego Raoul Duke (which Depp spent 7 months living with H.S.T. preparing for by learning his moves and habits) What a lot of people don't know is H.S.T. was a famed journalist in his own right. A main voice of dissatisfaction from America's underbelly commentating on the death of the American dream in the 1970s, he was one of the last americans to be evacuated from Saigon after America left Vietnam, as well as spending 1 year on the road with the Hell's Angels in their prime.
Originally "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" appeared as a two part news coverage story in Rolling Stone magazine. Hunter was sent to Las Vegas by the magazine to cover a race. Instead he spent all his expenses on drugs, booze, a candy apple red cadillac, pick up his lawyer, Oscar Acosta (the film/book's Dr Gonzo) and headed to Las Vegas in search of the American Dream. This is what he wrote about and the style of Gonzo was unleashed upon the world. The prime function of Gonzo is basically the writer becomes part of the story as it happens and in some cases makes it happen. The term is used nowadays not just in writing but also in music and even porn. All these can be traced back to Thompson's foundations.
Hunter once wrote of his friend Oscar Acosta: '[he] was one of God's own prototypes - a high powered mutant of some kind who was never even considered for mass production. He was too weird to live and too rare to die'. He could, I'm sure, have just as easily been writing about himself. There will be greater writers and there will be lesser writers, but there will never be another Hunter S. Thompson. It's only when you lose such a beautifully discordant note that you realise how much everything else sounds the same.
