What did people ever like about this guy?

Ehhhh... I sort of liked him a little bit, but he was never as good as his fans insisted.

I'll resist the temtation to say anything more negative than that.

I predicted this.... about 23 years ago.

This guy was so good that I used to laugh out loud at his writing. He was a true writing genius. He was also weak, self-centered, and an All-American asshole. RIP

He was an interesting character, if not the Great Author he was made out to be. I read a collection of his hate mail a few years ago and thought some of it was pretty clever and funny. He obviously had talent. Unfortunately he lost his sense of humor somewhere along the way.

RIP.

His writing had a definite flavor to it; no question that he was a great satirical talent. I enjoyed some of the more bizarre passages in Generation of Swine.

He was also quite clearly unbalanced. I suspect he was bipolar. His problems with substance abuse were, of course, part of his legend.

This is the way he ends, not with a bang but a whimper. Oops, scratch that; he did leave with a bang.

My guess is Bang, then Whimper.

I wonder how long before we hear that the recent election results, and the direction the country is heading, drove him to suicide.....so his blood is on Bush's hands?

If we could only link oil to it, the circle would be complete.

Very sad for all those he left behind I am sure. He always fascinated me. "Richard Nixon once said he represented 'that dark, venal, and incurably violent side of the American character.' " (Fox News)

Sounds like Nixon got that one right…

Phillip- *blink* *blink blink* Did Nixon really say that? Wow. Never knew the man was so perspicacious... That's dead on. And literary.

Hunter was one of the first but thanks to the everyman medium of the internet there are so many more who can be found like him. Ace, Iowahawk, Skippy @ EES and a thousand more writers who can cleft a phrase or spin a graf are out there dancing naked just for our enjoyment... god, I love you guys. In a completely manly way of course.

But Hunter was the first. He was the first lit guy we bonded with in college. He was the one who made us want to get ripped to the tits on drugs and booze and drive out to the desert and have a visionquest... before we realized how stupid, self-destructive and completely gay that was.

I'm gonna drink of fifth of Wild Turkey tonight and see how far I can get through Fear and Loathing in LV before I pass out. *sigh.*

Unfortunately, I can not say that I am surprised. The man was completely derranged and it was obvious that it had been getting worse over the last two years. His articles on Espn.com's Page 2, once a weekly occurance, were now posted with months between them and had also become increasingly rambling (yes, even for Thompson). Frankly, a person can not injest as many drugs as he did over a 40 year time span and not have their brain turn to complete mush. He says that his drug use was overexaggerated and that might have been true, post-Nixon. But with him living around the Haight-Asbury district of San Francisco in the 60s it is hard to imagine him not overindulging at the time.
I always knew he would take his own life as I knew that he would go the same way that Hemmingway did. It says here that Hunter was devastated when Hemmingway killed himself.
In the past year he lost two of his best friends in George Plimpton and Warren Zevon. That pain along with any physical ailments he might have been enduring (my guess is that we may here he had cancer) must have been too much for Hunter. Then again, it would not surprise me at all to hear that he was just drunk and got a little too careless with his firearm collection.
There are a lot of people who owe a huge debt of gratitude to Thompson. Any journalist who damns the censors and writes as he/she feels or thinks, any entertainer who feels the need to be outspoken on any number of issues needs to tip their cap to the Good Doctor today.
Some of his stuff was inreadable and his opinions, at times, made me want to throw the book through a window. But Thompson entertained me more times than not, which is why I read his work.
If you get the chance, pick up "Where the Buffalo Roam" starring Bill Murray. Thompson never acknowledged the movie and it is said to only be "Based on the Twisted Ledgend of Hunter S. Thompson" but it is very entertaining.

I hope that he was courteous enough to put down some plastic.

"Richard Nixon once said he represented 'that dark, venal, and incurably violent side of the American character.'

No, Thompson said that about Nixon.

Also, I'm not sure that some of the joking about someone's death (especially suicide) is much better than DU postings.

Elliott, wtf.
You don't joke like that about somebody's death unless its Courtney Love.

Sigh. I give up.

Hunter Thompson used the "I'll talk dirty so they'll notice me" routine to great effect. Before the 60's he would've been ignored, and rightfully so. His writings are childish and like his mind, lack any clear, coherent vision. Like those of William Burroughs, they were merely lurid descriptions of his tacky little life. Pity that the dirty talk routine has been used so much to such great, especially todaty. And it is not surprised he shot himself. I shall not miss him.

72 Raisins,
Didn't your Momma tell you that if you can't say anything nice, then talk about Courtney Love?

LOL.

By the way, that scene in "Fear and Loathing" with the lizard men in the casino? That's real. I've seen that.

lauraw:
I was talking nice. That's about the most positive spin I put on a tacky pervayor of a degenerate lifestyle that eventually killed him. And by the way, I was heavily infuenced by him and William Burroughs myself to try a lot of self destructive things I might not have done, so I know firsthand what a bad influence he was.

Bill from INDC:

Don't give up. You need to give people a course correction when they are getting out of line, even at this Blog, which is looser than some of the others. (Ace is pure gold, but it's humor and conservative commentary).

You know, I've always felt that conservative Blogs drew mostly courteous posters. Sure, you'll find dirty words and the like, but you won't find the preponderance of visceral hatred that you'll see at KOS. That place is where the real swamp/hellhole can be found.

They have 400,000 readers (so they claim), and yet control the dialog to such an extent that only true haters are allowed in. I've never gotten past the irony of that. There at KOS you have the ideal platform for open discussion, a Blog that allows comments, yet they won't let you in if you post a carefully worded, conservative comment. The troll accusation will rear its ugly head, and they'll start ripping down your comments as fast as you can put them up.

I may be wrong about conservative Blogs, but I bet if you went to LGF, you'd never see the hatred that you can find at KOS.

You are completely right. I don't care if HST wrote a book entitled "Hey Rube: Blood Sport, the Bush Doctrine, and The Downward Spiral of Dumbness," the man deserves to be left in peace. It's OK to slam his writing, but to dance on the grave of the loved and lost is not really reflective of a kind soul. Rather, it's shows one to be a person of heart-wooden.

So, please people, let the man rest in peace, and feel sorry for his loved ones that he left behind, especially his wife, son and grandchild.

Keep up the slamming (slicing like a fuckin' hammer) of Hunter's commentary, however. That's fair game, in my humble opinion.

Best regards,

KCTrio

My apologies Lauraw, I wasn't aware that you were in charge of monitoring comments today.
I'll try to be more careful next time.

Thompson virtually invented a medium with his first book, Hell's Angles. He went on to refine and define that medium in his next two, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and F&L on the Campaign Trail.
Then something happened and none of his later work even came close, as a matter of fact, many people think that the slide started after F&L in Las Vegas.
Spending three and a half decades as a hasbeen, as a caricature of oneself, never able to put together anything nearly as good as one's early work just has to wear on the soul.
One sees the same thing in child actors, sports stars and the like. The person that peaks early in life has to be exceptionally well centered to cope with life after the peak.
Thompson wasn't well centered. It's a damned shame, especially for his family.

OK, I just saw Bill's disgust with flippancy, but I'll wade in this far (apologies Ardolino, please stop reading if you think you'll be offended)

I am one to wish Bill & Hillary health when they're sick. I hope Jimmy Carter dies peacefully in his sleep at 108. Politics do not define my core being. But I will say this, when someone kills himself, especially a rich & powerful someone, the level of sympathy is at a low ebb.

My thoughts yesterday when I found out he was dead (no reason given): somewhat sad at the passing of a fellow human, thoughts of some chuckles from his columns of 2-3 years ago. This morning, when I discover he excessively lobotimized himeslf with the terminal ballistic properties of buckshot?

I'm convinced that he hadn't much brain left (and I mean that chemically).

As Jersey Matt noted, he had become increasingly incoherent and erratic in his writings. What once were seemingly concious paranoid rambling increasingly became truly detached and in fact spooky paranoid ramblings. Bush was, to HST, the sum of all evil and the true Antichrist. After years of chemical abuse the guy finally went nuts.

I feel badly that the poor soul went over the brink, but it's an apparent fact that "your brain on drugs" tends to end up on the ceiling. Looks like BDS has claimed it's first high profile victim.

God grant rest to his tortured soul.

Requiem in Pacem

He was very bad and needed a good spanking.

I'm sorry guys, those comments may have come across as sounding mean but I didn't intend them that way.

Honestly, I didn't like HST's writing. At all.

But, let's not ignore what this man did. He COMPLETELY screwed over his family by committing suicide. I have a hard time generating respect for him when he is willing to have those who did care about him suffer simply because he did not wish to deal with life.

My sympathy goes to his family. They did not begin to deserve this.

But Thompson? He took a coward's way out and left his family in the lurch.

Sorry, but I have a lot of trouble respecting anybody who does that.
-=Mike

MikeSC, You nailed it!

lauraw, if it's any consolation, I got what you meant. :)

And I agree with MikeSC's assessment concerning respect (although I thought Hunter wrote a couple of good books 20+ years ago but not much since).

I don't understand why people think we should respect Thompson's family and their wishes when Thompson didn't have any respect for them himself. Regardless, I think they deserve sympathy because that is decent human behavior. Thompson, OTOH, doesn't thanks to the type of exit he chose, nor does news of his death deserve anything more than a shrug.

Later,
bbeck

Peter:

I'd aver that history is riddled with people that were productive geniuses that never waned; they evolved. Of course, there are some striking examples of people that hit their peak at an early age, then spend the rest of their lives withering.

Although, I've discovered that many of these selfsame examples are urban legends and not the actual truth of the person.

Take Isaac Newton. He was supposed to have had two or three miracle years, and then the rest of his life was simply spent reworking his original "Questions" that he had taken notes on in his early years.

This is far from the truth. It's exactly the opposite that is the truth with Newton. There's a great biography of Newton entitled "Never at Rest," which sums up the matter entirely.

I don't know the ratio of the stable, evolving geniuses versus the flashpoint/declining geniuses, but I would say that many times people romanticize their heroes, thinking that they had two or three productive years. But once one actually starts reading the works of the genius in question, one sometimes finds that the caricature is false.

As to HST, I don't know. But geniuses or even talented second-rate people can have tortured minds. Read the letters of Lincoln to Joshua Speed during his years of courting, and you'll see a tortured mind.

Lincoln's actually an interesting example. People have romanticized him in the opposite way. There are those that say he became a genius while President. Rubbish. All one has to do is read his first major speech, "On the Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions," that he delivered before he was thirty, and you'll see all the threads of his gift of writing in that one speech. His was a mind that was also never at rest.

Just my 30 cents (sorry for the long post).

KCTrio

I just liked "Where the Buffalo Roam".

YIKES!!! In today's gospel (Lk 6:36-38) Jesus said: "stop judging and you will not be judged ... stop condeming and you will be forgiven ... for the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you." I shall pray for you, Hunter Thompson, and may you Rest in Peace.

MikeSC, don't be so quick to judge...certainly don't judge how his family feels.

My Dad killed himself, and I don't feel the way you think a family member would feel about it.

He had a cancer which had metastasized, which already had him so ill life hardly seemed worth sustaining ( fatigue, brutal migraines, bone pain) and which meant a prolonged and miserable, and exceedingly expensive death in a cancer ward.

He knew what his end would be if he didn't take control...and did it to spare others as much as himself.

I never blamed him or felt he had been a coward, quite the contrary..

I don't know the circumstances of Thompson's last days, but you could wait a day or two before pronouncing him a selfish coward.

I won't comment on the manner of his passing. That has already been covered sufficiently. However, the best career analogy for Thompson has to be Brando. Both men had their best work early on and spent the rest of their lives living off their reputation but not living up to it. In Thompson's case he ended up taking himself much too seriously politically.

His main problem is that in reality his lifestyle was closer to Libertarian than leftist. He never caught on to this fact and was always bummed out when the modern neo-coms didn't perform the way he wanted them to. The playbook didn't work because he was playing on the wrong team.

But I will say this, when someone kills himself, especially a rich & powerful someone, the level of sympathy is at a low ebb.

Mental illness and pain often have NOTHING to do with being "rich & powerful," much like cancer doesn't make a distinction.

Sorry, but your sentiment is ridiculous.

"This morning, when I discover he excessively lobotimized himeslf with the terminal ballistic properties of buckshot?"

No to put too fine a (hollow) point on it, but he did not fully emulate his literary idol, and die the Heming-way.

His last toast was with a Colt .45

Either way, it was a MUCH classier exit than drowning in your own vomit like a lot hard doping/boozing types do.

I read a lot of his works, and I read a lot about him. As a person, he didn't seem to be a very nice guy. But what he lacked in kindness, he made up for with balls, unique insight, and a razor-sharp mind that inevitably dulled over the years. I have yet to meet one substance abuser that likes what they see in the mirror, and although I never met him I suspect that he was feeling very little happiness throughout his life.

He was an exceptional writer, and its a shame he didn't derive more pleasure from his profession. One of my favorite articles he wrote, "Strange Rumblings in Aztlan", also demonstrated his ability as a journalist, a profession that he equally despised. I was sorry when I read about his death, but I can't say that it surprised me a lot. Rest in peace, Dr. Thompson.

I mean how can you top, "Shut up you old fart and go in and mix me a martini?"

At the same time I believe Thompson wasted much too much energy later in life on trying to be outrageous and shocking.

Maybe the change in my own perspective has to do with the fact that I am 52 years old, a conservative, born-again Christian with a wife, two kids, two dogs and three cats.

I was saddened to hear of Hunter's death. I must say he was one of the last people I'd ever expect to kill himself.

The following was cut from my original entry:

When I was a college student and aspiring journalist Hunter Thpmson's tome, "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972" was required reading.

I particularly appreciated his take on Hubert, Tricky Dick and Ed Muskie. Of course, at the time I had campaigned for George McGovern. (read aboev to complete thoughts)

Hey Phillip, Wrong buddy ...Hunter S Thompson said that particular remark about Nixon( and correct he was) not the way you understand it .
Boys and girls we have all lost a great American Hero..to say the least.

And that from a Canadian.
weep for the lost but smile for the gain from his insight.