"Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas" (1971) by Hunter S. Thompson (1937-2005)

[DaveO]

I was recently reintroduced to this famous or  infamous paragraph from Hunter Thompson's Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas.

For some it would be appropriate for the "Intrepid Traveler"   For others it would be far far off base.  In any case its a terrific paragraph ...and its about traveling.......

"We had two bags of grass, seventy-five pellets of mescaline, five sheets of high powered blotter acid, a salt shaker half full of cocaine, and a whole galaxy of multi-colored uppers, downers, screamers, laughers... and also a quart of tequila, a quart of rum, a case of Budweiser, a pint of raw ether and two dozen amyls. Not that we needed all that for the trip, but once you get locked into a serious drug collection, the tendency is to push it as far as you can." 

Its a good thing he included the case of Bud, to help take the edge off.

[chefgunshow]

My favorite part of that book is when he is looking out the window and seeing where, with (paraphrase) "the right kind of eyes that wave of the 60's finally broke and rolled back into the sea." And my aunt says its only about drugs.

Rum diary is solid too, and my friends that work in politics insist that Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 is the most accurate portrayal of working in a campaign.

I was kind of obsessed with Thompson in my early 20's and when he was still alive, I went to the Woody Creek Tavern to watch Monday night football. The Woody Creek Tavern was the closest bar to Thompson's house and a place he frequented. Steelers versus Pats. I didn't want to be 'that guy' (even though I was), so I didn't ask the bartender about him until a few beers deep. I can't remember his name, but he was a bald dude from Connecticut. Anywho, he expressed extreme exasperation at the antics he was subjected to at closing time several times a week. About this time, a cowboy threatened me because I wasn't local and he rightly called me out on being a fanboy. I may be dumb, but I'm not dumb enough to fight a cowboy. So l left and camped on Independence pass in the rain. It was cold, and there were shotgun blasts periodically through the night.

And that's my story.

[southdenverhoo]

My favorite part of that book is when he is looking out the window and seeing where, with (paraphrase) "the right kind of eyes that wave of the 60's finally broke and rolled back into the sea." And my aunt says its only about drugs.

Rum diary is solid too, and my friends that work in politics insist that Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 is the most accurate portrayal of working in a campaign.

I was kind of obsessed with Thompson in my early 20's and when he was still alive, I went to the Woody Creek Tavern to watch Monday night football. The Woody Creek Tavern was the closest bar to Thompson's house and a place he frequented. Steelers versus Pats. I didn't want to be 'that guy' (even though I was), so I didn't ask the bartender about him until a few beers deep. I can't remember his name, but he was a bald dude from Connecticut. Anywho, he expressed extreme exasperation at the antics he was subjected to at closing time several times a week. About this time, a cowboy threatened me because I wasn't local and he rightly called me out on being a fanboy. I may be dumb, but I'm not dumb enough to fight a cowboy. So l left and camped on Independence pass in the rain. It was cold, and there were shotgun blasts periodically through the night.

And that's my story.

A very dear female friend of mine lived and worked year-round as a bartender in Aspen for 4 or 5 years in the 80s and spoke with a similar degree of "exasperation"--perfect word, there-- about that with which she had to put up, on a regular basis, as well.  I don't think she worked at WCT, but was a regular there; but in any event HST didn't limit his activities to his oft-declared favorite joint and Aspen wasn't very big, so sooner or later every professional server was going to have dealt with the entire local adult population, at something less than its best.

Though Aspen in the 80s was a town in which impaired and entitled assholes were not scarce, she told HST stories with a particular vehemence.

A lot of them, if I recall correctly, involved M-80s packed inside hamburger "bombs," and similar instruments of noisy messiness, detonated indoors for maximum effect, that some poor server had to clean up afterwords...but there was frequent gunplay as well.  Sometimes it's best not to meet our heroes, or people who have dealt with them intimately in their private lives. Especially our heroes in the arts.

It doesn't detract one iota from my enjoyment of lines like this:

I felt like a monster reincarnation of Horatio Alger: A man on the move, and just sick enough to be totally confident.

[DonRocks]

[Three people like this? Hmm .. it might be going on the reading list.]

[MsDiPesto]

When I was 12, his Hells Angels book was out in paperback at the local corner grocery/candy store and I bought it (not sure what that says about me at 12  ). Imagine my surprise when I was in study hall in high school and a friend passed me the latest Rolling Stone that had a large excerpt of F&LinLV. I was blown away and devoured it. When F&L on the Campaign Trail came out, I read that. Later, in college, I took a class that examined several contemporary works (Joan Didion, etc) and Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was one of them. He was scheduled to do a reading at my school too, but when I showed up to the lecture hall with a friend, there was a note saying it was cancelled to a death in Thompson's family. Maybe Thompson himself put that note up and spent the evening in one of the local watering holes.

Check it out Don, you can get a rush just from reading it.

[DaveO]

Some examples of early Thompson journalism before he gained fame.

[dcs]

 

My favorite part of that book is when he is looking out the window and seeing where, with (paraphrase) "the right kind of eyes that wave of the 60's finally broke and rolled back into the sea." And my aunt says its only about drugs. 

For chefgunshow.  This deserves to be read in its entirety for all of its poetic majesty and keen observation in the moment with perspective it took others years to acquire.  First person narrative of the death of the American Dream.

Strange memories on this nervous night in Las Vegas. Five years later? Six? It seems like a lifetime, or at least a Main Era "“ the kind of peak that never comes again. San Francisco in the middle sixties was a very special time and place to be a part of. Maybe it meant something. Maybe not, in the long run"¦ but no explanation, no mix of words or music or memories can touch that sense of knowing that you were here and alive in that corner of time and the world. Whatever it meant"¦

 

History is hard to know, because of all the hired bullshit, but even without being sure of "history" it seems entirely reasonable to think that every now and then the energy of a whole generation comes to a head in a long fine flash, for reasons that nobody really understands at the time "“ and which never explain, in retrospect, what actually happened. My central memory of that time seems to hang on one or five or maybe forty nights "“ or very early mornings "“ when I left the Fillmore half-crazy and, instead of going home, aimed the big 650 Lightning across the Bay Bridge at a hundred miles an hour wearing L. L. Bean shorts and a Butte sheepherder's jacket"¦ booming through the Treasure Island tunnel at the lights of Oakland and Berkeley and 

Richmond, not quite sure which turn-off to take when I got to the other end (always stalling at the toll-gate, too twisted to find neutral while I fumbled for change)"¦ but being absolutely certain that no matter which way I went I would come to a place where people were just as high and wild as I was: No doubt at all about that. There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda"¦ You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. And that, I think, was the handle "“ that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn't need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting "“ on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. 

 

 So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark "“ that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back. 

[chefgunshow]

Thanks. You're right. My bullshit paraphrase doesn't come close. I also really liked the collections of letters, The Proud Highway. Particularly when pissed about something, no one cans vitriol like the good doctor. But that quote reminded me of what we all forget about Thompson, it wasn't all zaniness and chemicals. Brutal eloquence I guess.

[dcs]

Warren Hinckle, 77, Ramparts Editor Who Embraced Gonzo Journalism, Dies, by William Grimes, August 25, 2016 on nytimes.com