Authors: Hunter S. Thompson
ISBN-13: 9780743240994, ISBN-10: 0743240995
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Adult Publishing Group
Date Published: December 2002
Edition: First Touchstone Edition 10th Anniversar
To summarize Hunter S. Thompson s career is nearly impossible. His writing covered sports, politics, personal letters, social commentary, and Gonzo Journalism -- his own brand of hyper-subjective observation of nearly everything that crosses his path. A welcomed troublemaker, the name Hunter S. Thompson conjures the image of a man bearing firearms and whiskey, daring his readers to question their realities.
First published in 1990, Songs of the Doomed is back in print by popular demand! In this third and most extraordinary volume of the Gonzo Papers, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson recalls high and hideous moments in his thirty years in the Passing Lane and no one is safe from his hilarious, remarkably astute social commentary.
With Thompson's trademark insight and passion about the state of American politics and culture, Songs of the Doomed charts the long, strange trip from Kennedy to Quayle in Thompson's freewheeling, inimitable style. Spanning four decades 1950 to 1990 Thompson is at the top of his form while fleeing New York for Puerto Rico, riding with the Hell's Angels, investigating Las Vegas sleaze, grappling with the "Dukakis problem," and finally, detailing his infamous lifestyle bust, trial documents, and Fourth Amendment battle with the Law. These tales often sleazy, brutal, and crude are only the tip of what Jack Nicholson called "the most baffling human iceberg of our time."
Songs of the Doomed is vintage Thompson a brilliant, brazen, bawdy compilation of the greatest sound bites of Gonzo journalism from the past thirty years.
This third installment of the Gonzo Papers is a chronologically arranged selection of stories, letters, journals and reporting, allowing readers to see how Thompson's brand of "new journalism'' has evolved over the years.
Editor's Note | xi | |
Author's Note | ||
Let the Trials Begin | 3 | |
Electricity | 13 | |
Last Train from Camelot | 21 | |
Note from Ralph Steadman | 24 | |
The Fifties: Last Rumble in Fat City | ||
Tarred and Feathered at the Jersey Shore | 29 | |
Saturday Night at the Riviera | 32 | |
Prince Jellyfish | 35 | |
Hit Him Again, Jack, He's Crazy | 35 | |
Interview | 45 | |
Cherokee Park | 52 | |
Fleeing New York | 60 | |
The Sixties: What the Hell? it's Only Rock and Roll ... | ||
Letter to Angus Cameron | 67 | |
The Rum Diary | 69 | |
Revisited: The Puerto Rican Problem | 107 | |
The Kennedy Assassination | 111 | |
Back to the U.S.A. | 111 | |
Hell's Angels: Long Nights, Ugly Days, Orgy of the Doomed ... | 113 | |
Midnight on the Coast Highway | 116 | |
Ken Kesey: Walking with the King | 118 | |
LSD-25: Res Ipsa Loquitor | 120 | |
Chicago 1968: Death to the Weird | 122 | |
First Visit with Mescalito | 126 | |
The Seventies: Reaping the Whirlwind, Riding the Tiger | ||
Iguana Project | 141 | |
Never Apologize, Never Explain | 147 | |
Vegas Witchcraft | 148 | |
High-Water Mark | 152 | |
Fear and Loathing | 153 | |
Lies--It Was All Lies--I Couldn't Help Myself | 154 | |
Ed Muskie Doomed by Ibogaine: Bizarre Drug Plot Revealed | 156 | |
Washington Politics | 159 | |
Summit Conference in Elko: Secret Gathering of the Power Elite | 161 | |
Opening Statement: HST | 166 | |
Rolling Stone: Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here | 174 | |
Dance of the Doomed | 176 | |
Checking into the Lane Xang | 177 | |
Whooping It Up with the War Junkies | 182 | |
Confidential Memo to Colonel Vo Don Giang | 193 | |
Memo to Jim Silberman on the Death of the American Dream | 197 | |
Letter to Russell Chatham | 204 | |
The Eighties: How Much Money do you Have? | ||
Welcome to the '80s | 209 | |
Love on the Palm Beach Express: The Pulitzer Divorce Trial | 211 | |
Sugarloaf Key: Tales of the Swine Family | 230 | |
The Silk Road: Fast Boats on the Ocean at Night | 235 | |
Fishhead Boys | 235 | |
The Mariel Boat Lift | 240 | |
The Murder of Colonel Evans | 246 | |
Letter to Ralph Steadman | 253 | |
Letter to Ken Kesey | 261 | |
Last Memo from the National Affairs Desk | 263 | |
Memo from the Sports Desk | 270 | |
Wild Sex in Sausalito | 272 | |
The Dukakis Problem: Another Vicious Beating for the New Whigs | 275 | |
Secret Cables to Willie Hearst | 281 | |
Re: Qaddafi | 281 | |
Re: The Column | 282 | |
San Francisco Examiner Columns | 286 | |
The New Dumb | 286 | |
Fear and Loathing in Sacramento | 289 | |
Strange Ride to Reno | 292 | |
Amor Vincit Omnia | 294 | |
The Death of Russell Chatham | 297 | |
Editor's Note | 299 | |
Whiskey Business | 300 | |
I Knew the Bride When She Used to Rock and Roll | 303 | |
Community of Whores | 306 | |
Return to the Riviera Cafe | 309 | |
Avery: Making Sense of the '60s | 311 | |
German Decade: The Rise of the Fourth Reich | 314 | |
Turbo Must Die | 318 | |
Memo to Jay Johnson, Night Editor, San Francisco Examiner | 320 | |
Warning Issued on Cocaine | 322 | |
Welcome to the Nineties: Welcome to Jail | ||
Editor's Note | 328 | |
Nothing But Crumbs | 330 | |
Arrest Warrant and Charges | 332 | |
Beware | 335 | |
This Is a Political Trial ... | 336 | |
Thompson Hit with 5 Felonies | 337 | |
Memo to Hal Haddon: Attack Now | 338 | |
The Art of Hitting the One Iron | 340 | |
Motion and Order to Dismiss the Case | 341 | |
Hunter Hails Legal Triumph for Americans | 342 | |
Press Release, Owl Farm, 5/31/90 | 344 | |
Final Analysis: Gerald Goldstein, Esq. | 346 | |
A Letter to The Champion: A Publication of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, Keith Stroup, Executive Director | 352 | |
Later That Year ... | 355 | |
Author's Note | 357 |