March 1, 2007
Dan Toner, ABR Editorial Assistant
It was in June 2005 that Hunter Stockton Thompson, one of my heroes, was scattered ceremoniously to the four winds, six months after his death by a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Actually, ‘scattered’ may be too polite a word for it. About half of Thompson’s remains were boomed skywards from a 153-foot cannon erected on the Woody Creek property that he had called Owl Farm – and home – for much of his artistic life. The cannon, which sports the infamous two-thumbed gonzo fist at its business end, was commissioned by Thompson’s celluloid doppelgänger, Johnny Depp, and will remain as a permanent memorial to the great man.
I, like many generations of young people, came to HST via his classic novel, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1971), a landmark work of creative writing that clenched a deep meditation on the human condition within a flying (two-thumbed) fist aimed squarely at the forces of conservatism. It was, of course, a revelation. Never had I experienced the physicality of the medium to this degree; never had I borne witness to such an aggressive advocacy of social digression; never had I known the conscientious and creative urges to bond so forcefully, and in such unlikely climes. Fear and Loathing was so energised and powerful that it felt athletic, competitive even, despite its outrageously unhealthy subject matter. I was inspired by the author’s combative attack on what we might call ‘wowserism’; astounded by the artistry with which he denounced it; and more than a little star-struck by the audacity he displayed in championing such high-voltage degeneracy. By the time I had finished Hell’s Angels ( 1967) and The Curse of Lono (1983), I was an unabashed hero-worshipper. I was around twenty one by then, content largely to accept that Thompson’s style was the result of a natural talent unleashed in an unnatural habitat.
It wasn’t until recently, as a more circumspect twenty-six year old, that I read the first volume of his collected letters, and began to understand just what a shallow version of the man I had been idolising. The HST that emerged for me was, in fact, a dedicated, tireless craftsman, utterly devoted to the art of writing, who married his ambition to create with an innate, unconquerable hunger for justice. He was an anti-authoritarian and an iconoclast well before fame found him. And while first impressions count, I feel that, having come somehow closer to an understanding of him through his personal correspondence, it is his generosity, discipline and fearlessness that have come to define him for me, over and above his legendary appetite for excess.
In James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922), John Eglington comments that, ‘[t]he supreme question of a work of art is out of how deep a life does it spring’. Here then, is the clue to the power of Thompson’s letters: they painstakingly reveal the depth of the man in a way his combustible literature only rarely managed to do. This isn’t to say that his work was shallow, but that the choppy tides of his manic and aggressive style tended to obscure, at least for the casual reader, the eternal springs from which they gained their energy. In a way, Thompson’s letters become the bathyscaphe through which we observe what in him is lost to the surface: that obscured world, that intimate space where access is restricted to those who have earned his trust. Where else could we witness this bastion of social justice and anti-conservatism announcing that, ‘[i]t used to worry me that I was really an evil redneck, but now I sort of like it …’ Letter-writing here, can be seen as a site of intersections, the informal tray on which he serves favourite meals to favourite people. Such meals do not require the orderliness of a set menu; they allow the haphazardness of personality to dictate the taste and the pace of the banquet.
There was one literary forum where HST was able to tread the line between his public and private selves: journalism. In particular, his articles for Rolling Stone represent some of his most incisive and inspiring work as a social commentator and author of conscience. Never a shrinking violet, Thompson’s cluttered columns in that venerable magazine became the pulpit where he criticised presidents, corporations, authoritarians, industries, celebrities, blowhards and religious figures – with so much passion, humour and earnestness. It was here that Thompson found a medium of relevance, a position of centrality where his opinion not only counted, but influenced opinion. The history of American journalism cannot be told without mentioning the legacy of Hunter S. Thompson. It is my opinion that in Australia today there has never been more need for a journalistic maverick like HST, and that such an influential stirrer and rabble-rouser has never seemed so far away.
Hunter S. Thompson injected himself into his writing, whether it was for personal or public consumption. In so doing he set an example, one that not enough young writers are following in Australia. In our political and social climate of rapidly encroaching conservatism, his letters felt like a personal challenge, and were no small factor in my resolve to dedicate some time and energy to my own politically conscientious writing. The left wing has lost its bite, if not its bark, and the journalistic obsession with ‘balance’ is coming at the cost of a strident presence for non-conservative views. Balance be damned! Thompson confirmed for me that conservatism has to be railed against if its influence is to be countered.
Dan Toner, ABR Editorial Assistant
It was in June 2005 that Hunter Stockton Thompson, one of my heroes, was scattered ceremoniously to the four winds, six months after his death by a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Actually, ‘scattered’ may be too polite a word for it. About half of Thompson’s remains were boomed skywards from a 153-foot cannon erected on the Woody Creek property that he had called Owl Farm – and home – for much of his artistic life. The cannon, which sports the infamous two-thumbed gonzo fist at its business end, was commissioned by Thompson’s celluloid doppelgänger, Johnny Depp, and will remain as a permanent memorial to the great man.
I, like many generations of young people, came to HST via his classic novel, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1971), a landmark work of creative writing that clenched a deep meditation on the human condition within a flying (two-thumbed) fist aimed squarely at the forces of conservatism. It was, of course, a revelation. Never had I experienced the physicality of the medium to this degree; never had I borne witness to such an aggressive advocacy of social digression; never had I known the conscientious and creative urges to bond so forcefully, and in such unlikely climes. Fear and Loathing was so energised and powerful that it felt athletic, competitive even, despite its outrageously unhealthy subject matter. I was inspired by the author’s combative attack on what we might call ‘wowserism’; astounded by the artistry with which he denounced it; and more than a little star-struck by the audacity he displayed in championing such high-voltage degeneracy. By the time I had finished Hell’s Angels ( 1967) and The Curse of Lono (1983), I was an unabashed hero-worshipper. I was around twenty one by then, content largely to accept that Thompson’s style was the result of a natural talent unleashed in an unnatural habitat.
It wasn’t until recently, as a more circumspect twenty-six year old, that I read the first volume of his collected letters, and began to understand just what a shallow version of the man I had been idolising. The HST that emerged for me was, in fact, a dedicated, tireless craftsman, utterly devoted to the art of writing, who married his ambition to create with an innate, unconquerable hunger for justice. He was an anti-authoritarian and an iconoclast well before fame found him. And while first impressions count, I feel that, having come somehow closer to an understanding of him through his personal correspondence, it is his generosity, discipline and fearlessness that have come to define him for me, over and above his legendary appetite for excess.
In James Joyce’s Ulysses (1922), John Eglington comments that, ‘[t]he supreme question of a work of art is out of how deep a life does it spring’. Here then, is the clue to the power of Thompson’s letters: they painstakingly reveal the depth of the man in a way his combustible literature only rarely managed to do. This isn’t to say that his work was shallow, but that the choppy tides of his manic and aggressive style tended to obscure, at least for the casual reader, the eternal springs from which they gained their energy. In a way, Thompson’s letters become the bathyscaphe through which we observe what in him is lost to the surface: that obscured world, that intimate space where access is restricted to those who have earned his trust. Where else could we witness this bastion of social justice and anti-conservatism announcing that, ‘[i]t used to worry me that I was really an evil redneck, but now I sort of like it …’ Letter-writing here, can be seen as a site of intersections, the informal tray on which he serves favourite meals to favourite people. Such meals do not require the orderliness of a set menu; they allow the haphazardness of personality to dictate the taste and the pace of the banquet.
There was one literary forum where HST was able to tread the line between his public and private selves: journalism. In particular, his articles for Rolling Stone represent some of his most incisive and inspiring work as a social commentator and author of conscience. Never a shrinking violet, Thompson’s cluttered columns in that venerable magazine became the pulpit where he criticised presidents, corporations, authoritarians, industries, celebrities, blowhards and religious figures – with so much passion, humour and earnestness. It was here that Thompson found a medium of relevance, a position of centrality where his opinion not only counted, but influenced opinion. The history of American journalism cannot be told without mentioning the legacy of Hunter S. Thompson. It is my opinion that in Australia today there has never been more need for a journalistic maverick like HST, and that such an influential stirrer and rabble-rouser has never seemed so far away.
Hunter S. Thompson injected himself into his writing, whether it was for personal or public consumption. In so doing he set an example, one that not enough young writers are following in Australia. In our political and social climate of rapidly encroaching conservatism, his letters felt like a personal challenge, and were no small factor in my resolve to dedicate some time and energy to my own politically conscientious writing. The left wing has lost its bite, if not its bark, and the journalistic obsession with ‘balance’ is coming at the cost of a strident presence for non-conservative views. Balance be damned! Thompson confirmed for me that conservatism has to be railed against if its influence is to be countered.
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1 comments:
Great blog, Dan. So true when considering current attempts by mainstream media to stifle alternative viewpoints.
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