296 lines
15 KiB
Markdown
296 lines
15 KiB
Markdown
---
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created_at: '2014-10-05T21:40:54.000Z'
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title: Kurt Vonnegut, the Art of Fiction No. 64 (1977)
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url: http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3605/the-art-of-fiction-no-64-kurt-vonnegut
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author: dnetesn
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points: 64
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story_text: ''
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comment_text:
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num_comments: 5
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story_id:
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story_title:
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story_url:
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parent_id:
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created_at_i: 1412545254
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_tags:
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- story
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- author_dnetesn
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- story_8413548
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objectID: '8413548'
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---
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![undefined](/il/fdb8a09feb/large/Hunter-S-Thompson.jpg "undefined")
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In an October 1957 letter to a friend who had recommended he read Ayn
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Rand’s The Fountainhead, Hunter S. Thompson wrote, “Although I don’t
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feel that it’s at all necessary to tell you how I feel about the
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principle of individuality, I know that I’m going to have to spend the
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rest of my life expressing it one way or another, and I think that I’ll
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accomplish more by expressing it on the keys of a typewriter than by
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letting it express itself in sudden outbursts of frustrated violence. .
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. .”
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Thompson carved out his niche early. He was born in 1937, in Louisville,
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Kentucky, where his fiction and poetry earned him induction into the
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local Athenaeum Literary Association while he was still in high school.
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Thompson continued his literary pursuits in the United States Air Force,
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writing a weekly sports column for the base newspaper. After two years
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of service, Thompson endured a series of newspaper jobs—all of which
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ended badly—before he took to freelancing from Puerto Rico and South
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America for a variety of publications. The vocation quickly developed
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into a compulsion.
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Thompson completed The Rum Diary, his only novel to date, before he
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turned twenty-five; bought by Ballantine Books, it finally was
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published—to glowing reviews—in 1998. In 1967, Thompson published his
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first nonfiction book, Hell’s Angels, a harsh and incisive firsthand
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investigation into the infamous motorcycle gang then making the
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heartland of America nervous.
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Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which first appeared in Rolling Stone in
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November 1971, sealed Thompson’s reputation as an outlandish stylist
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successfully straddling the line between journalism and fiction writing.
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As the subtitle warns, the book tells of “a savage journey to the heart
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of the American Dream” in full-tilt gonzo style—Thompson’s hilarious
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first-person approach—and is accented by British illustrator Ralph
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Steadman’s appropriate drawings.
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His next book, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ’72, was a
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brutally perceptive take on the 1972 Nixon-McGovern presidential
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campaign. A self-confessed political junkie, Thompson chronicled the
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1992 presidential campaign in Better than Sex (1994). Thompson’s other
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books include The Curse of Lono (1983), a bizarre South Seas tale, and
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three collections of Gonzo Papers: The Great Shark
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Hunt (1979), Generation of Swine (1988) and Songs of the
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Doomed (1990).
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In 1997, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman,
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1955-1967, the first volume of Thompson’s correspondence with everyone
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from his mother to Lyndon Johnson, was published. The second volume of
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letters, Fear and Loathing in America: The Brutal Odyssey of an Outlaw
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Journalist, 1968-1976, has just been released.
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•
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Located in the mostly posh neighborhood of western Colorado’s Woody
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Creek Canyon, ten miles or so down-valley from Aspen, Owl Farm is a
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rustic ranch with an old-fashioned Wild West charm. Although Thompson’s
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beloved peacocks roam his property freely, it’s the flowers blooming
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around the ranch house that provide an unexpected high-country
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tranquility. Jimmy Carter, George McGovern and Keith Richards, among
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dozens of others, have shot clay pigeons and stationary targets on the
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property, which is a designated Rod and Gun Club and shares a border
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with the White River National Forest. Almost daily, Thompson leaves Owl
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Farm in either his Great Red Shark Convertible or Jeep Grand Cherokee to
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mingle at the nearby Woody Creek Tavern.
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Visitors to Thompson’s house are greeted by a variety of sculptures,
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weapons, boxes of books and a bicycle before entering the nerve center
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of Owl Farm, Thompson’s obvious command post on the kitchen side of a
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peninsula counter that separates him from a lounge area dominated by an
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always-on Panasonic TV, always tuned to news or sports. An antique
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upright piano is piled high and deep enough with books to engulf any
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reader for a decade. Above the piano hangs a large Ralph Steadman
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portrait of “Belinda”—the Slut Goddess of Polo. On another wall covered
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with political buttons hangs a Che Guevara banner acquired on Thompson’s
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last tour of Cuba. On the counter sits an IBM Selectric typewriter—a
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Macintosh computer is set up in an office in the back wing of the house.
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The most striking thing about Thompson’s house is that it isn’t the
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weirdness one notices first: it’s the words. They’re
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everywhere—handwritten in his elegant lettering, mostly in fading red
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Sharpie on the blizzard of bits of paper festooning every wall and
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surface: stuck to the sleek black leather refrigerator, taped to the
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giant TV, tacked up on the lampshades; inscribed by others on framed
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photos with lines like, “For Hunter, who saw not only fear and loathing,
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but hope and joy in ’72—George McGovern”; typed in IBM Selectric on
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reams of originals and copies in fat manila folders that slide in piles
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off every counter and table top; and noted in many hands and inks across
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the endless flurry of pages.
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Thompson extricates his large frame from his ergonomically correct
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office chair facing the TV and lumbers over graciously to administer a
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hearty handshake or kiss to each caller according to gender, all with an
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easy effortlessness and unexpectedly old-world way that somehow
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underscores just who is in charge.
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•
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We talked with Thompson for twelve hours straight. This was nothing out
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of the ordinary for the host: Owl Farm operates like an
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eighteenth-century salon, where people from all walks of life congregate
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in the wee hours for free exchanges about everything from theoretical
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physics to local water rights, depending on who’s there. Walter
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Isaacson, managing editor of Time, was present during parts of this
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interview, as were a steady stream of friends. Given the very late hours
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Thompson keeps, it is fitting that the most prominently posted quote in
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the room, in Thompson’s hand, twists the last line of Dylan Thomas’s
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poem “Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night”: “Rage, rage against the
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coming of the light.”
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For most of the half-day that we talked, Thompson sat at his command
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post, chain-smoking red Dunhills through a German-made gold-tipped
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cigarette filter and rocking back and forth in his swivel chair. Behind
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Thompson’s sui generis personality lurks a trenchant humorist with a
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sharp moral sensibility. His exaggerated style may defy easy
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categorization, but his career-long autopsy on the death of the American
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dream places him among the twentieth century’s most exciting writers.
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The comic savagery of his best work will continue to electrify readers
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for generations to come.
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•
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. . . I have stolen more quotes and thoughts and purely elegant little
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starbursts of writing from the Book of Revelation than from anything
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else in the English Language—and it is not because I am a biblical
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scholar, or because of any religious faith, but because I love the wild
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power of the language and the purity of the madness that governs it and
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makes it music.
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HUNTER S. THOMPSON
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Well, wanting to and having to are two different things. Originally I
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hadn’t thought about writing as a solution to my problems. But I had a
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good grounding in literature in high school. We’d cut school and go down
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to a café on Bardstown Road where we would drink beer and read and
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discuss Plato’s parable of the cave. We had a literary society in town,
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the Athenaeum; we met in coat and tie on Saturday nights. I hadn’t
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adjusted too well to society—I was in jail for the night of my high
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school graduation—but I learned at the age of fifteen that to get by you
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had to find the one thing you can do better than anybody else . . . at
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least this was so in my case. I figured that out early. It was writing.
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It was the rock in my sock. Easier than algebra. It was always work, but
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it was always worthwhile work. I was fascinated early by seeing my
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byline in print. It was a rush. Still is.
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When I got to the Air Force, writing got me out of trouble. I was
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assigned to pilot training at Eglin Air Force Base near Pensacola in
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northwest Florida, but I was shifted to electronics . . . advanced, very
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intense, eight-month school with bright guys . . . I enjoyed it but I
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wanted to get back to pilot training. Besides, I’m afraid of
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electricity. So I went up there to the base education office one day and
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signed up for some classes at Florida State. I got along well with a guy
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named Ed and I asked him about literary possibilities. He asked me if I
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knew anything about sports, and I said that I had been the editor of my
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high-school paper. He said, “Well, we might be in luck.” It turned out
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that the sports editor of the base newspaper, a staff sergeant, had been
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arrested in Pensacola and put in jail for public drunkenness, pissing
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against the side of a building; it was the third time and they wouldn’t
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let him out.
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So I went to the base library and found three books on journalism. I
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stayed there reading them until it closed. Basic journalism. I learned
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about headlines, leads: who, when, what, where, that sort of thing. I
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barely slept that night. This was my ticket to ride, my ticket to get
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out of that damn place. So I started as an editor. Boy, what a joy. I
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wrote long Grantland Rice-type stories. The sports editor of my
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hometown Louisville Courier Journal always had a column, left-hand side
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of the page. So I started a column.
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By the second week I had the whole thing down. I could work at night. I
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wore civilian clothes, worked off base, had no hours, but I worked
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constantly. I wrote not only for the base paper, The Command Courier,
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but also the local paper, The Playground News. I’d put things in the
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local paper that I couldn’t put in the base paper. Really inflammatory
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shit. I wrote for a professional wrestling newsletter. The Air Force got
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very angry about it. I was constantly doing things that violated
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regulations. I wrote a critical column about how Arthur Godfrey, who’d
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been invited to the base to be the master of ceremonies at a firepower
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demonstration, had been busted for shooting animals from the air in
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Alaska. The base commander told me: “Goddamn it, son, why did you have
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to write about Arthur Godfrey that way?”
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When I left the Air Force I knew I could get by as a journalist. So I
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went to apply for a job at Sports Illustrated. I had my clippings, my
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bylines, and I thought that was magic . . . my passport. The personnel
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director just laughed at me. I said, “Wait a minute. I’ve been sports
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editor for two papers.” He told me that their writers were judged not by
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the work they’d done, but where they’d done it. He said, “Our writers
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are all Pulitzer Prize winners from The New York Times. This is a
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helluva place for you to start. Go out into the boondocks and improve
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yourself.”
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I was shocked. After all, I’d broken the Bart Starr story.
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INTERVIEWER
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What was that?
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THOMPSON
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At Eglin Air Force Base we always had these great football teams. The
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Eagles. Championship teams. We could beat up on the University of
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Virginia. Our bird-colonel Sparks wasn’t just any yo-yo coach. We
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recruited. We had these great players serving their military time in
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ROTC. We had Zeke Bratkowski, the Green Bay quarterback. We had Max
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McGee of the Packers. Violent, wild, wonderful drunk. At the start of
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the season McGee went AWOL, appeared at the Green Bay camp and he never
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came back. I was somehow blamed for his leaving. The sun fell out of the
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firmament. Then the word came that we were getting Bart Starr, the
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All-American from Alabama. The Eagles were going to roll\! But then the
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staff sergeant across the street came in and said, “I’ve got a terrible
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story for you. Bart Starr’s not coming.” I managed to break into an
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office and get out his files. I printed the order that showed he was
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being discharged medically. Very serious leak.
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INTERVIEWER
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The Bart Starr story was not enough to impress Sports Illustrated?
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THOMPSON
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The personnel guy there said, “Well, we do have this trainee program.”
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So I became a kind of copy boy.
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INTERVIEWER
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You eventually ended up in San Francisco. With the publication in 1967
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of Hell’s Angels, your life must have taken an upward spin.
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THOMPSON
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All of a sudden I had a book out. At the time I was twenty-nine years
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old and I couldn’t even get a job driving a cab in San Francisco, much
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less writing. Sure, I had written important articles for The
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Nation and The Observer, but only a few good journalists really knew
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my byline. The book enabled me to buy a brand new BSA 650 Lightning, the
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fastest motorcycle ever tested by Hot Rod magazine. It validated
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everything I had been working toward. If Hell’s Angels hadn’t happened I
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never would have been able to write Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas or
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anything else. To be able to earn a living as a freelance writer in this
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country is damned hard; there are very few people who can do
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that. Hell’s Angels all of a sudden proved to me that, Holy Jesus,
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maybe I can do this. I knew I was a good journalist. I knew I was a good
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writer, but I felt like I got through a door just as it was closing.
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INTERVIEWER
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With the swell of creative energy flowing throughout the San Francisco
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scene at the time, did you interact with or were you influenced by any
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other writers?
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THOMPSON
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Ken Kesey for one. His novels One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s
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Nest and Sometimes a Great Notion had quite an impact on me. I looked
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up to him hugely. One day I went down to the television station to do a
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roundtable show with other writers, like Kay Boyle, and Kesey was there.
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Afterwards we went across the street to a local tavern and had several
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beers together. I told him about the Angels, who I planned to meet later
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that day, and I said, “Well, why don’t you come along?” He said, “Whoa,
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I’d like to meet these guys.” Then I got second thoughts, because it’s
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never a good idea to take strangers along to meet the Angels. But I
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figured that this was Ken Kesey, so I’d try. By the end of the night
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Kesey had invited them all down to La Honda, his woodsy retreat outside
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of San Francisco. It was a time of extreme turbulence—riots in Berkeley.
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He was always under assault by the police—day in and day out, so La
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Honda was like a war zone. But he had a lot of the literary,
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intellectual crowd down there, Stanford people also, visiting editors,
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and Hell’s Angels. Kesey’s place was a real cultural vortex.
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