Hunter S. Thompson. One of my all-time favorite writers.
He once typed the Great Gatsby from beginning to end. “In my younger and more vulnerable years my father gave me some advice that I’ve been turning over in my mind ever since.” Just like that until the very end. Reading it wasn’t enough for him to learn the rhythm. (He was of course on something, but weren’t they all?)
He used to call up his friends at all hours of the night and just start rambling. They’d always take the call, too. They’ve said getting a call at 4 in the morning when Hunter was alive was a joy. Now it just marks a tragedy.
I watched the 2006 documentary “Buy the Ticket, Take the Ride” last week. It was a decent film. It had some nuggets and old footage that I had never heard or seen before. It made me laugh and it made me miss him.
Ralph Steadman, the artist and Hunter’s partner in crime, was in it. Tim and I saw Ralph speak about four years ago when he was on tour for his book, “The Joke’s Over.” We sat in metal folding chairs lined up in a school’s basement on Oak street.
Ralph had a slideshow of old photos. He played recordings of Hunter. He did an impression of him, too. It was about a year and a half after Hunter died. We bought two signed copies of the book and then devoured it within a couple of days.
They met while on assignment covering the Kentucky Derby in 1970, which resulted in the piece, “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved.” Ralph didn’t know he was going to be part of making the story. You know, Gonzo.
Their first meeting as told by Ralph in the British newspaper “The Independent:”
“I had been watching someone chalk racing results on a blackboard while I sipped a beer, and I was about to turn and get myself another when a voice like no other I had ever heard cut into my thoughts and sank its teeth into my brain. It was a cross between a slurred Karate chop and gritty molasses.
‘Um . . . er you . . . er . . . wouldn't be from England . . . er . . . would you . . . er . . . an artist . . . maybe . . . er . . . what the!!’
I had turned around and two fierce eyes, firmly socketed inside a bullet-shaped head, were staring at a strange growth I was nurturing on the end of my chin. ‘Holy shit!’ he exclaimed. ‘They said I was looking for a matted-haired geek with string warts and I guess I've found him.’”
The rest is all art and magic.
Check out the famous Lizard Lounge from “Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas” here for $3,000:
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