From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=1470">iwan pritchard</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

THE SUICIDE of Hunter S. Thompson, aged 65, according to the New York Times, or 67, according to the Washington Post, at his home in Aspen, may definitively mark the conclusion of the chaotic "baby-boomer" rebellion that began in the 1950s and crested in the 1960s, and which was dignified with the title of "the counter-culture."<BR>
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"Counter" it was, as an expression of defiance toward everything normal and reliable in society. "Culture" it was not, any more than Thompson's incoherent scribblings constituted, as they were so often indulgently described, a form of journalism.<BR>
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When a major representative of any dramatic period in history dies, it is tempting to proclaim the end of an epoch, but the lonely death of Thompson--he shot himself in his kitchen--seems more emblematic than any other associated with the '60s. The incident might even have been accidental, brought on by one of Thompson's self-storied flings into the ingestion of garbage drugs. Who knows?<BR>
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But Louisa Davidson, wife of the sheriff of Pitkin County, the jurisdiction wherein the death occurred, probably had it right: "he was not going to age gracefully. He was going to go out with a bang. He was tormented."<BR>
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Whatever the actual circumstances, it is difficult to imagine a still-living personage, or even one who preceded him into eternal silence and collective forgetfulness, more representative of his time. William S. Burroughs, the prosewriter once hailed for allegedly reinventing the American novel, died at 83 in 1997. Allen Ginsberg, the versifier who had supposedly changed American poetry forever, expired the same year at 70. Ken Kesey, another overrated writer, joined them in 2001. The comedian Lenny Bruce and the author Jack Kerouac left the scene long, long before, in the '60s themselves. Who is left? No one but minor figures.<BR>
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Thompson had much in common with Burroughs and Ginsberg. First, their products were mainly noise. Their books were reissued but now sit inertly on bookstore shelves, incapable of inspiring younger readers, or even nostalgic baby boomers, to purchase them. Thompson claimed credit for the invention of "gonzo journalism," epitomized by his great success, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, published in 1972. He will inevitably be hailed by newswriters as the creator of a genre. But if his work is taught to the young, it is as an exemplar of the madness of the '60s, not as literature or journalism. Aside from his own later works, including such trivia, bearing his signature, as The Great Shark Hunt, Generation of Swine, and Songs of the Doomed, of what did "gonzo" journalism consist? Thompson left no authorial legacy.<BR>
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It has long been argued that lasting literature is an impossibility without imitation and emulation, and that although young authors often produce works ridiculously imitative of their idols, real writers grow out of such mimesis to gain recognition for their own, individual abilities. But who can imagine a youthful talent beginning with an exercise in the gonzo style? Thompson produced no others like him, for the same reason Burroughs and Ginsberg generated no schools of novel-writing or verse. One may go further and say they had nothing to teach the young, except to emit a cacophony. <BR>
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Indeed, it would be one thing to say that Thompson and the others like him, such as Burroughs and Ginsberg, are dated. Even embarrassingly old-fashioned artistic works, bereft of immediacy for those who are not part of the environment from which they emerged, have the capacity for revival. But Thompson produced a clamor without content. Doubtlessly, the most pathetic aspect of the '60s phenomenon was the absolute conviction of Thompson and those who encouraged him that "living in the moment" really did count more than anything else in the world, that history never existed and that the future was their property.<BR>
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His enablers included lefty journalist Warren Hinckle III, who first published Thompson's experiments in incoherent "reportage" in a forgotten magazine called Scanlan's, and pop huckster Jann S. Wenner, the grand ayatollah of Rolling Stone, a tabloid which began as a pop music paper, then tried to make itself over as a serious journal, and is now read by . . . who? For some commentators, the greatest compliment paid to Thompson was the incorporation of a dishonest, heartless figure modeled on him, and named Uncle Duke (after Raoul Duke, the narrator of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas) into Doonesbury. But that strip is generally known for its tone of dishonesty and heartlessness, and, like the writings of Thompson, seems extremely dated, increasingly unread, and finally irrelevant in its mean-spiritedness.<BR>
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Thompson, as I can say from personal witness, was not flattered by the Doonesbury valentine. "I don't steal from his stuff, do I?" Thompson grunted in a bar one afternoon in San Francisco. For him, imitation, or caricature, was the least sincere form of flattery, and in his bilious reaction there might have resided a microscopic element of self-awareness. He may well have understood that the drugs, gunfire, motorcycle mishaps, public rantings, and widespread adulation in which he was immersed were evanescent, and that his books were too thin to keep his memory alive for very long.<BR>
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One must imagine that in his own middle '60s Hunter Thompson looked into the mirror and saw that nobody needed a gonzo interpretation of the world after September 11, that nobody was amused by his capacity to survive fatal doses of sinister concoctions, and that, increasingly, nobody knew or cared who he was.<BR>
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He was flattered to be described as chronicler of "the death of the American dream." In reality, he described a nightmare from which America awoke years ago.<BR>

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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=1450">Lolly Gaggin</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

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Hunter Thompson was no hero, and I'm sure his balls were withered away from years of drug and alcohol abuse.<BR>
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Hunter Thompson proved Misti WRONG... he actually had NO balls.  He committed the ultimate act of cowardice... suicide.<BR>
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If you wish to think of him as a funny Bill Murray character or a sexy Johnny Depp character, then that just cements your idiocy.<BR>
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I used to think Hunter was a great man, a great writer... until I GREW UP and realized what a sick human he was (thanks for proving my point, Lord Gonzo).  He was a sick, dangerous man.  Not a hero.  His works will be largely forgotten.  Or at least they SHOULD be.<BR>
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He committed the ultimate sin, the ultimate act of cowardice.<BR>
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I pray God has mercy on his soul.<BR>

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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=1269">Injun Joe</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

Excellent posting.  You're right about his sickness and his total LACK OF BALLS.  <a href="/blend/wv.cgi?id=2005.02.23.12.29.23397">Fear and Loathing</a> 
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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=268">Misti</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

That's mighty benevolent of ya to offer a prayer up to the Big Kahuna on behalf of a dead writer you despise. While you're sayin' your prayers in your star spangled jammies say a prayer for yourself. Pray for a life. You seem to be in sad need of one. <BR>
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Gawd, what a dipshit...
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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=1450">Lolly Gaggin</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

"He had balls."  Nope, just severe mental illness and massive substance abuse... and all you "Gonzo" lovers just enabled his disease.  And now he is dead with a bullet in his head... and all you "fans" ought to feel really angry and disappointed with Thompson.  Let him be your role model towards cleaning up your own lives...<BR>
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You are dead wrong about Hunter S. Thompson.<BR>

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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=872">cryingshame58</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

hhhmmmmmmmmmmm<BR>
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<a href="http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Hunter%20Thompson%20Sales">http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/apus_story.asp?category=1110&slug=Hunter%20Thompson%20Sales</a>
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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=268">Misti</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

Bottom line: Thompson lent his brilliant light to the world. He was not a sheep. He was a true original. He didn't cut and paste and he wasn't a silly sycophant. Didn't waste his time at a website he loathed, showing off multiple dumb ass personalities to people he ridiculed and insulted at every opportunity. Didn't believe in Bush or God. Didn't take himself too seriously. Didn't believe in heroes. Didn't suffer from delusions of grandeur. He knew he wasn't a "great" writer like Hemingway or Fitzgerald or Faulkner. He knew he was flawed. Still, the man wrote his ass off and lived his life as he wanted to live it with no apology to anyone. He was not a cog in a rusty wheel as so many Americans are these days. I do not admire the rampant drug use. That does not impress me. I am impressed by his originality. <BR>
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What a stupid cliche to say that people who kill themselves are cowards. Some people struggle for years with depression and finally give up for whatever reason. Doesn't make them cowardly.<BR>
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Finally, leave God and moralizing out of it, if at all possible. Your brand of God has a lot of splaining to do, Lucy.
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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=268">Misti</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

Mark,<BR>
I for one would not shed a tear if you never appeared here again. What will be said of you when YOU are dead? Who will miss you? Just curious...
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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=74">Echolocation</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

Uh-oh, Kirk, looks like it's time once more to transplant some sprouting cut'n'pastes into the Political Garden where they can grow like weeds LOL!!
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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=1">Kirk, Blender-Keeper</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

I've changed the name of the Politics Board to the Soapbox Forum.  <BR>
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There's been some talk here lately that really belongs there but I'm not going to move posts yet.<BR>
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BUT -- QUIT WITH THE MOTHERF***ING CUT AND PAST. Say what you want to say, post all the links you want, post teaser excerpts, but stop putting the whole article on the site. It's a legal liability and annoying.
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From: <a href="/blend/av.cgi?id=1176">aparajita</a><BR>
Date: 23 February 2005<P>

full moon....
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