Sunday, August 22, 2004
The Washington Post looks at Blood Sport, the Bush Doctrine, and the Downward Spiral of Dumbness: Modern History From the Sports Desk, the upcoming book from Hunter S. Thompson, gonzo journalist extraordinare.
Thompson is a genuinely unique figure in American journalism, a superb comic writer and a ferociously outspoken social and political critic. Anything he writes is worth reading, even when it radiates serious signs of having been composed under the influence of something rather more hallucinating than office coffee. So at least Thompson would like us to believe, since spaced-out is the persona he adopted back in the 1960s and has lived off ever since. No doubt he's done his share of bad (and good) stuff, but my hunch is that in significant measure this is an act; you don't think as clearly as Thompson does or write as much as he does -- more than a dozen books to date, not to mention fugitive journalism and scads of letters -- in a state of perpetual, drug-induced nirvana. Even though some of Thompson's stuff is over-the-top showing signs of having "been composed under the influence of something rather more hallucinating than office coffee," most of his work has generally been very good -- often tip-toeing the line between manic-filled rants and pure genius. I probably won't pick this book up right away, but it's definitely going on my "To Read" list.
1:07:00 PM
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