After some years (decades even) in the wilderness, Hunter S. Thompson is now starting to be given the recognition he deserves. Not because his current writing matches the quality of that of the late sixties and early seventies, more because he's managed to stay around long enough to influence a critical mass of readers.
This recognition is manifested in two ways. "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas" has been republished in America by the Modern Library, which signifies his move from cult to literary status. The book also includes two other extremely well chosen works: "Strange Rumblings In Aztlan", the piece he was working on at the same time as Fear and Loathing, partly about Oscar Acosta aka the Brown Buffalo aka Dr Gonzo "my attorney"; and also "The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved", the birth of gonzo, about which more below. The other manifestation is that Fear and Loathing is finally being filmed, after many failed attempts. The unlikely instigator of this is Johnny Depp, who is playing the part of Raoul Duke/HST.
What is gonzo?
The essence of pure gonzo writing can be summed up as follows; go somewhere interesting, get shitfaced, take notes, publish the notes unedited. The style was invented by Hunter after visiting the Kentucky Derby with the intention of writing a straight piece of journalism about it. The sequence of events went something like this; go somewhere interesting (the Derby), get shitfaced, take notes, find yourself unable to write the piece, get hassled by the editor, write up the notes you've got into a story that's more about yourself than the event, send that in for publication. Fear and Loathing was an attempt to write a pure gonzo piece, and by his own admission it failed as gonzo. Most of the events happened, but the time scales were played around with and a fictional element added. It may have failed as gonzo but what came out was a masterly piece of journalistic fiction.
The Proud Highway
Recently published in the UK is the first of three volumes of Hunter's letters, covering 1955 to 1967. The paranoid bastard has kept a copy of everything he's ever written. More on this when I get time to read it, but it's obviously a vital purchase for any serious student of gonzo.
Hunter on the web
Having got all that off my chest, we come to the point of this page. If you do a search on the web for Fear and Loathing, you'll quickly find out two things: the phrase itself has passed into popular usage and 95% of the links are nothing to do with Hunter; and there is also a bucketload of piss poor gonzo pastiche out there, which you probably want to avoid. So here are some bona fide high quality links to satisfy your gonzo urges.
The best - visit these first
- Christine O's Great Thompson Hunt
- The motherlode. Reviews, information, scans of posters and book covers, and enough links to keep you busy until Polo Is My Life is published.
- Jason Hart's HST Page
- An good fan page, a little heavy on the web trickery for my liking though.
- Las Vegas Sun
- Inspired by the film shooting in Las Vegas, The Sun put together a very slick, good-looking site. Using different drugs to navigate the site is very cute (and rather radical in 90s America).
General Hunter Stuff
- AspenOnline
- Hunter S. Thompson Home Page. It gives the impression of having Hunter's involvement, or at least sanction, but I'm not sure if this is true. Certainly a good source of information on his activities in his home area.
- Hunter S. Thompson
- The HST page at Bohemian Ink Magazine. Mostly links, but who am I to carp.
- HST Pictures
- A collection of pictures from other web pages.
- The Strange And Terrible Saga Of...
- Another fan page. No longer maintained, but it has a good links page, including the most ridiculous uses of the phrase Fear And Loathing on the web.
Hunter's Books
- Bad Craziness
- A small excerpt from Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas, including one of Ralph Steadman's extraordinary illustrations.
- Doomed Planet
- The HST page from one of the web's booksellers. More than just a list, so worth a visit.
- Booksmith
- Another bookseller's Hunter page. Also merits a look.
- Allcampus
- About the recent CD version of Fear And Loathing, which is well worth a couple of your hard-earned beer tokens, by the way.
Fear And Loathing - The Movie
- Empire Magazine
- News about the making of the film.
- Corona
- Another page tracking the progress of the film.
- Las Vegas Review Journal
- A feature on the shooting of the film in Las Vegas in August. The Review Journal's columnist Carol Cling tracked the making of the film in her Shooting Stars column. Here are the relevant links: 28th July, 4th August, 11th August, 18th August, 25th August.
- Dreams
- Fanzine dedicated to Terry Gilliam, who is directing the film.
- Benicio Del Toro
- A fan page about the actor playing Dr Gonzo. You can also find an interview with him at Hollywood Online.
Written:140997 Last Modified:071197 Maintained By:drbob