Hunter S. Thompson's hazy, semi-autobiographical account of a drugs-fuelled bender under Las Vegas skies has been on my reading list for some time now. As something of an aspiring journalist myself, I've been thinking of this book as a rite of passage;
something that everybody fascinated by print media should read. There is no doubt that what this book has to say about the American Dream, psychedelics, cops, casinos, cults, drag racing, foreigners, apes, the Sixties and Jefferson Airplane (amongst other things) is important. However, this is the anti-journalist's journal. Thompson, a self-proclaimed 'doctor of journalism', is a far cry from the stuffy, suited-up caricature you might associate the press world with.
As with all good book reviews, let me begin by laying out the (incredibly loose) plot. The year is 1971; Raoul Duke (Thompson) and his attorney, Dr Gonzo (based on Thompson's real-life acquaintance, Oscar Acosta) are sent to Las Vegas to cover The Mint 400, a prestigious off-road motorcycle race. After drinking their way through this, they decide it would be entertaining to infiltrate a police officers' drugs awareness conference. Other notable details include a near-suicidal bath scene, a probing highway patrol cop, a Barbara Streisand fanatic, a litany of horrified service workers and enough vomit to fill a swimming pool. Always lurking in the background of such escapades is ether, amyl nitrite, mescaline, andrenochrome and a host of other, more commonly-known, substances. This book deals in drugs I've never heard of before; drugs that should probably never leave whatever underground laboratory they're cooked up in; drugs that I'm too scared to type into a search engine, let alone seek out for myself. If there is one thing to take away from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, it should be consideration for what you're putting into your body.
Of course, there's a lot more to take away from this book besides 'drugs are bad'. Thompson's writing style, branded 'gonzo journalism' - a sort of documentation of events that incorporates the writer's own experiences, in a way that 'traditional journalism' does not - is just one of these takeaways. Impartiality doesn't quite exist; accuracy isn't a huge deal; personal experiences are favoured over facts. Such ideas certainly shine through in Fear and Loathing - technically, we've got a reporter. But there's no way to confirm that anything that happens is factually accurate, especially considering the near-permanent drug-induced state Thompson was under at the time. I think this is just one aspect of the book that makes for a particularly interesting read; we're learning about these remarkable, often stomach-churning, experiences that we know are probably true. But it is up to us, as readers, to decide how far we want to believe in the depravity of our two protagonists.
Amplifying the already insane experience of reading this book is Ralph Steadman's illustrations, sprinkled throughout the pages in what can only be described as a grotesque but wholly necessary addition. How could a description of Dr Gonzo 'kneeling, stark naked, in the closet, vomiting into his shoes' be complete without a vividly explicit sketch, no details omitted, to complement it? Steadman and Thompson worked closely over the span of the latter's career, and one can certainly see why; Steadman's erratic, graphic and often ugly illustrations are the perfect accompaniments to Thompson's erratic, graphic and often ugly writing.
To conclude - as all good book reviews tend to reach some kind of conclusion - I would not recommend this book to anyone who is expecting to learn about traditional journalism in any kind of professional capacity, or anyone with a particularly weak stomach. I would, however, recommend this book to everyone else. At its best, it holds a magnifying glass up to the pitfalls of the American Dream and extreme drug culture. At its worst, it's a fairly entertaining account of two awful people tripping balls in the desert.