Some Thoughts on Celebrity Death

I read an article someone posted on facebook trying to victimize Amy Winehouse, and in the process they seemed to scapegoat a lot of other people without looking in the mirror.  They compared her to a schitzophrenic person and I thought this was completely off base.  Here is the article:

"It’s time to stop blaming the victims of drug overdose" by KGRANJU

Here was my reply over article I posted on facebook:

"The lady who wrote this does have a lot of good points I completely agree with regarding all the TMZ's and stand up comedians and late night talk show hosts like Conan O'Brien/Dave Letterman/Jay Leno who make a fortune out of whoever's misfortune is a hot news story, however, I don't jive on the whole comparison with schizophrenia and victimizing her. For whatever reason, she initially made the choice to shoot heroin into her vein, sure, she might have been addicted and had less control over her actions as time went on, but the first time she did it, she knew what she was getting into and still did it. The person who has a mental illness like schizophrenia or multiple personality disorder or whatever the case may be doesn't just decide one day to be crazy, it is something they have no choice over."

Turning Amy Winehouse into a victim isn't the answer, it is just an invitation for people to get addicted to drugs and turn the drug dealers into the villain.  Sure, the dealers who sold her the drugs obviously were not thinking with Amy's best intention, but were any of us either?  Is the fast food or grocery store employee the villain for selling us chicken selects other products that slowly kill us just like the drugs sold to Amy Winehouse, Layne Staley,  Jimi Hendrix,  2Pac, River Pheonix, and any other celebrity that has died pushed them to death?

Just like Rexroth wrote when Dylan Thomas died, I think in many ways all of us, myself and each individual that died included, are to blame for these things happening.  We take part in a culture where we vicariously live through these other people, especially their tragedies.  The way I see it, trying to victimize these people is not the fucking answer, at all, and in many ways I think it is just contributing to the whole cult of personality that is causing this.  Sure empathy and sympathy are two human emotions that can have an enormous positive effect in helping one another through tough times, but do you really think the tears the lady who wrote the blog was so proud to mention were for Amy Winehouse and her family, or were they for herself?

Amy Winehouse knew where the path she was on was leading, and she continually made the choice to continue it, even if she had less and less control in the matter as time went on.  She knew, just like Layne Staley clearly knew where he was headed when one examines the lyrics of his work with Mad Season:

"Wake up young man, it's time to wake up

Your love affair has got to go
For 10 long years, for 10 long years
The leaves to rake up
Slow suicide's no way to go
Blue, clouded grey
You're not a crack up
Dizzy and weakened by the haze
Moving onward
So an infection not a phase

The cracks and lines from where you gave up
They make an easy man to read
For all the times you let them bleed you
For a little peace from God you plead, and beg
For a little peace from God you plead

Wake up young man, wake up, wake up
Wake up, wake up, wake up, wake up

Wake up young man, it's time to wake up
Your love affair has got to go, yeah
For 10 long years, for 10 long years,
The leaves to rake up
Slow suicide's no way to go
Slow suicide's no way to go
Wake up, wake up, wake up
Wake up, wake up, wake up"

She knew what she was doing, just like the person with heart disease knows what they are doing to themselves with they eat the big Mac, just like I know every time I light up a cigarette.  Celebrity death from drug addiction is not a black and white issue, and I'm going to try to present the answer.  However, I do think that we all need to look in the mirror and accept the fact that we were in some way partly responsible.  The song she made about how she ain't going to rehab was a huge hit despite the fact that it was all about her not wanting to address her drug problem.  It was popular because we (I know not everyone liked her music, I am talking about we as in society, because clearly from the sales, a good majority of people did like it) made it popular, we bought it, and I cannot even begin to speculate on her psychology, but I am sure this success in some way supported her drug addiction, or at least monetarily supported it.

Here is the poem by Dylan Thomas I thought was so relivant to any situation like this...

THOU SHALT NOT KILL
A Memorial for Dylan Thomas

       I
They are murdering all the young men.
For half a century now, every day,
They have hunted them down and killed them.
They are killing them now.
At this minute, all over the world,
They are killing the young men.
They know ten thousand ways to kill them.
Every year they invent new ones.
In the jungles of Africa,
In the marshes of Asia,
In the deserts of Asia,
In the slave pens of Siberia,
In the slums of Europe,
In the nightclubs of America,
The murderers are at work.
They are stoning Stephen,
They are casting him forth from every city in the world.
Under the Welcome sign,
Under the Rotary emblem,
On the highway in the suburbs,
His body lies under the hurling stones.
He was full of faith and power.
He did great wonders among the people.
They could not stand against his wisdom.
They could not bear the spirit with which he spoke.
He cried out in the name
Of the tabernacle of witness in the wilderness.
They were cut to the heart.
They gnashed against him with their teeth.
They cried out with a loud voice.
They stopped their ears.
They ran on him with one accord.
They cast him out of the city and stoned him.
The witnesses laid down their clothes
At the feet of a man whose name was your name —
You.
You are the murderer.
You are killing the young men.
You are broiling Lawrence on his gridiron.
When you demanded he divulge
The hidden treasures of the spirit,
He showed you the poor.
You set your heart against him.
You seized him and bound him with rage.
You roasted him on a slow fire.
His fat dripped and spurted in the flame.
The smell was sweet to your nose.
He cried out,
“I am cooked on this side,
Turn me over and eat,
You
Eat of my flesh.”
You are murdering the young men.
You are shooting Sebastian with arrows.
He kept the faithful steadfast under persecution.
First you shot him with arrows.
Then you beat him with rods.
Then you threw him in a sewer.
You fear nothing more than courage.
You who turn away your eyes
At the bravery of the young men.
You,
The hyena with polished face and bow tie,
In the office of a billion dollar
Corporation devoted to service;
The vulture dripping with carrion,
Carefully and carelessly robed in imported tweeds,
Lecturing on the Age of Abundance;
The jackal in double-breasted gabardine,
Barking by remote control,
In the United Nations;
The vampire bat seated at the couch head,
Notebook in hand, toying with his decerebrator;
The autonomous, ambulatory cancer,
The Superego in a thousand uniforms;
You, the finger man of behemoth,
The murderer of the young men.

       II
What happened to Robinson,
Who used to stagger down Eighth Street,
Dizzy with solitary gin?
Where is Masters, who crouched in
His law office for ruinous decades?
Where is Leonard who thought he was
A locomotive? And Lindsay,
Wise as a dove, innocent
As a serpent, where is he?
       Timor mortis conturbat me.
What became of Jim Oppenheim?
Lola Ridge alone in an
Icy furnished room? Orrick Johns,
Hopping into the surf on his
One leg? Elinor Wylie
Who leaped like Kierkegaard?
Sara Teasdale, where is she?
       Timor mortis conturbat me.
Where is George Sterling, that tame fawn?
Phelps Putnam who stole away?
Jack Wheelwright who couldn’t cross the bridge?
Donald Evans with his cane and
Monocle, where is he?
       Timor mortis conturbat me.
John Gould Fletcher who could not
Unbreak his powerful heart?
Bodenheim butchered in stinking
Squalor? Edna Millay who took
Her last straight whiskey? Genevieve
Who loved so much; where is she?
       Timor mortis conturbat me.
Harry who didn’t care at all?
Hart who went back to the sea?
       Timor mortis conturbat me.
Where is Sol Funaroff?
What happened to Potamkin?
Isidor Schneider? Claude McKay?
Countee Cullen? Clarence Weinstock?
Who animates their corpses today?
       Timor mortis conturbat me.
Where is Ezra, that noisy man?
Where is Larsson whose poems were prayers?
Where is Charles Snider, that gentle
Bitter boy? Carnevali,
What became of him?
Carol who was so beautiful, where is she?
       Timor mortis conturbat me.

       III
Was their end noble and tragic,
Like the mask of a tyrant?
Like Agamemnon’s secret golden face?
Indeed it was not. Up all night
In the fo’c’sle, bemused and beaten,
Bleeding at the rectum, in his
Pocket a review by the one
Colleague he respected, “If he
Really means what these poems
Pretend to say, he has only
One way out —.” Into the
Hot acrid Caribbean sun,
Into the acrid, transparent,
Smoky sea. Or another, lice in his
Armpits and crotch, garbage littered
On the floor, gray greasy rags on
The bed. “I killed them because they
Were dirty, stinking Communists.
I should get a medal.” Again,
Another, Simenon foretold
His end at a glance. “I dare you
To pull the trigger.” She shut her eyes
And spilled gin over her dress.
The pistol wobbled in his hand.
It took them hours to die.
Another threw herself downstairs,
And broke her back. It took her years.
Two put their heads under water
In the bath and filled their lungs.
Another threw himself under
The traffic of a crowded bridge.
Another, drunk, jumped from a
Balcony and broke her neck.
Another soaked herself in
Gasoline and ran blazing
Into the street and lived on
In custody. One made love
Only once with a beggar woman.
He died years later of syphilis
Of the brain and spine. Fifteen
Years of pain and poverty,
While his mind leaked away.
One tried three times in twenty years
To drown himself. The last time
He succeeded. One turned on the gas
When she had no more food, no more
Money, and only half a lung.
One went up to Harlem, took on
Thirty men, came home and
Cut her throat. One sat up all night
Talking to H.L. Mencken and
Drowned himself in the morning.
How many stopped writing at thirty?
How many went to work for Time?
How many died of prefrontal
Lobotomies in the Communist Party?
How many are lost in the back wards
Of provincial madhouses?
How many on the advice of
Their psychoanalysts, decided
A business career was best after all?
How many are hopeless alcoholics?
René Crevel!
Jacques Rigaud!
Antonin Artaud!
Mayakofsky!
Essenin!
Robert Desnos!
Saint Pol Roux!
Max Jacob!
All over the world
The same disembodied hand
Strikes us down.
Here is a mountain of death.
A hill of heads like the Khans piled up.
The first-born of a century
Slaughtered by Herod.
Three generations of infants
Stuffed down the maw of Moloch.

       IV
He is dead.
The bird of Rhiannon.
He is dead.
In the winter of the heart.
He is Dead.
In the canyons of death,
They found him dumb at last,
In the blizzard of lies.
He never spoke again.
He died.
He is dead.
In their antiseptic hands,
He is dead.
The little spellbinder of Cader Idris.
He is dead.
The sparrow of Cardiff.
He is dead.
The canary of Swansea.
Who killed him?
Who killed the bright-headed bird?
You did, you son of a bitch.
You drowned him in your cocktail brain.
He fell down and died in your synthetic heart.
You killed him,
Oppenheimer the Million-Killer,
You killed him,
Einstein the Gray Eminence.
You killed him,
Havanahavana, with your Nobel Prize.
You killed him, General,
Through the proper channels.
You strangled him, Le Mouton,
With your mains étendues.
He confessed in open court to a pince-nezed skull.
You shot him in the back of the head
As he stumbled in the last cellar.
You killed him,
Benign Lady on the postage stamp.
He was found dead at a Liberal Weekly luncheon.
He was found dead on the cutting room floor.
He was found dead at a Time policy conference.
Henry Luce killed him with a telegram to the Pope.
Mademoiselle strangled him with a padded brassiere.
Old Possum sprinkled him with a tea ball.
After the wolves were done, the vaticides
Crawled off with his bowels to their classrooms and quarterlies.
When the news came over the radio
You personally rose up shouting, “Give us Barabbas!”
In your lonely crowd you swept over him.
Your custom-built brogans and your ballet slippers
Pummeled him to death in the gritty street.
You hit him with an album of Hindemith.
You stabbed him with stainless steel by Isamu Noguchi,
He is dead.
He is Dead.
Like Ignacio the bullfighter,
At four o’clock in the afternoon.
At precisely four o’clock.
I too do not want to hear it.
I too do not want to know it.
I want to run into the street,
Shouting, “Remember Vanzetti!”
I want to pour gasoline down your chimneys.
I want to blow up your galleries.
I want to bum down your editorial offices.
I want to slit the bellies of your frigid women.
I want to sink your sailboats and launches.
I want to strangle your children at their finger paintings.
I want to poison your Afghans and poodles.
He is dead, the little drunken cherub.
He is dead,
The effulgent tub thumper.
He is Dead.
The ever living birds are not singing
To the head of Bran.
The sea birds are still
Over Bardsey of Ten Thousand Saints.
The underground men are not singing
On their way to work.
There is a smell of blood
In the smell of the turf smoke.
They have struck him down,
The son of David ap Gwilym.
They have murdered him,
The Baby of Taliessin.
There he lies dead,
By the Iceberg of the United Nations.
There he lies sandbagged,
At the foot of the Statue of Liberty.
The Gulf Stream smells of blood
As it breaks on the sand of Iona
And the blue rocks of Canarvon.
And all the birds of the deep sea rise up
Over the luxury liners and scream,
“You killed him! You killed him.
In your God damned Brooks Brothers suit,
You son of a bitch.”

[1953]

Recent Trends in Cinematography - Drama. (Part 2 of 4)

Today's post will focus on the dramatic side of things, next week comedic, before the final concluding section.

To start with, loose and free camera movement is not anything that is completely new.  Look at a lot of the French New Wave, especially the movie Breathless by Jon-Loc Godard.  Here is an excert from it(SPOILER WARNING, if ya ain't seen it):

This film is credited by many, including myself, as really kick starting this revolution in cinematography, the French New Wave, the authorship theory and all that jazz.  In the last ten-twenty years, however, as huge changes in video technology, such as new lightweight cameras, filmmakers are now free to move around, to plan to move around, even more with the camera.  I an only imagine how heavy the camera that they used in the above scene could have been.  To see a camera move around like that, I could imagine in the perspective of someone living in that time, was very jarring and a taboo as far as what someone was supposed to do.  The camera was only supposed to move on a dolly of some sort, in a smooth manner so it wouldn't jar the viewer.  Godard, however, wanted to jar the viewers of his films, he wanted the viewer to remember his films, to see a style emerge in his films, similar to the way there was a style that carried over and evolved from film to film in Hitchcock's filmography.  Godard also wanted to destroy the bourgeoisie status cinema held in the French culture of his time.

Enough with Godard though, my view of his is nothing more than a history lesson for the director we are focusing on in this blog: Darren Arronfsky.  When one looks at his early films and Black Swan, there is a clear evolution that has occured in his filmmaking. In Pi, he began to use two techniques that would become motifs that would define many of his coming films.  The first is the use of quick, rhythmic edits, and the second is the use of certain cinematographic techniques and devices like the Snorricam.  In particular, an examination of a subway scene in Pi, contrasted against another subway scene in Black Swan, I believe will show this evolution in the cinematographic elements of his films:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oRJgvwg6ru0 (it appears this user had embedding disabled, so just click on that link to see the clip, right click and open in new tab/window if you want to keep this window open).

As it is very obvious, this scene, like the whole film in general, has a very gritty(though, I must clarify, gritty is not meant to be a bad thing) black and white look.  The camera work is clearly influenced by the style that Godard had developed in his stylistic protest against the Bourgeois French society, however, here it is not so much a protest, as it is an aesthetic choice made by Arronfsky.  The reasoning I believe he made the aesthetic choice in to have loose and free camera movement is also to jar the viewer, but not in the more avant-garde notion of jarring like Godard had done with Breahtless, instead, this aesthetic choice was made because it was internal to the meaning of the work itself, it, just like the quick editing and use of the Snorricam, was a way for the director to give us insight into the obviously tormented psychological state of Maximilian Cohen.  However, as we will see, in Black Swan, Arronfsky was able to evolve many of these techniques because of new technology that had developed since he filmed Pi.

There are many different aspects that are interesting to contrast in the cinematography of Black Swan when one looks back at Pi.  One of the most interesting of these for me is the use of the subway setting.  In Pi, as I have just stated, much of the camerawork in not just this scene, but the entire film in general, gives us a gritty feeling that allows us deeper insight into our protagonist.  In Black Swan, he would return to the subway again, but now, for a number of reasons including both budget, technology and probably a more developed personal methodology of how to make a film, Arronfsky was able to film in a crystal clear quality while still giving us insight into the dark and tormented psychology of his protagonist.  Part of the reasoning for this clarity in both the cinematography and the way it was edited together, Arronofsky cites as a result of this new technology allowing him to plan out exactly how he wanted each shot:

“We used a Canon 7D or 1D Mark IV for all the subway scenes; I could just carry a 7D and shoot on the subway all day with a very small crew. I did some tests with my wife beforehand to figure out my ASA, my stop, and how I was going to deal with the focus. I didn’t use any rigs with it because I wasn’t trying to shoot in the traditional way. I tested a bunch of different exposures and then brought the footage to Charlie Hertzfeld at Technicolor, who put it in the system so I could look at the highlights, the moiré and the resolution. Then I went back to the drawing board to do more tests. The 7D has more depth of field than the 5D, but I needed that because I didn’t have a follow-focus unit and needed to work really fast. I shot everything documentary-style. I did all the focus pulls by hand, and we’d just look at it on the camera’s monitor. I ended up shooting on a Canon 24mm lens at 1,600 ASA to get as much depth of field as possible at a stop of T81⁄2" Article.

While both scenes are definitely creepy in a way that you can't put your finger on(note: this creepiness is at least partially a result of Clint Mansell, a frequent collaborator with the director, but this is the focus of another blog entirely), it is hard for me to deny that the scene in Black Swan brought more of an emotional reaction in me than Pi had initially had(though don't take this as discounting Pi as a film, because it is more a testament to just how awesome the execution of Black Swan really was).  I believe part of this is because as opposed to rehashing old techniques in Pi he used to convey the emotion of his character, the small intimately connected crew as well as the planning he was able to put into Black Swan allowed him to not box himself in as far as how he was going to display the characters psychology through the frame.  


(Notes:  Once again, this hasn't been very organized, so I apologize for any incoherence, but I just wanted to to some free writing exercises regarding my thoughts on film.  This will be be continued when I focused on Parks and Recreation and how similar uses of new technology have allowed this show to really push the line as far as comedy, breaking new territory(at least through the early part of the 3rd season)

Hunter Thompson Paper - Fall 2009

(INITIAL NOTE: In continuing with the theme of posting my non-fiction writing on here, I am sharing a paper I wrote on Hunter S. Thompson.  I am planning on writing another draft of this after I graduate, however, until then, I WANT FEEDBACK! Once again, excuse formatting errors, I just copied and pasted from Word) 

                As a writer, Hunter S. Thompson would become a figure throughout his career that actively strived for a change within society.  His career would begin with an approach that Thompson himself said was influenced by various writers.   After a highly productive first ten years, Thompson would recluse himself away on his land in Colorado and various experiences, ranging from social to political to personal, would slowly silence him.   In 2005 Thompson’s depression reached a point where he took his own life with a self inflicted gunshot wound, and with only one abstract poem found at the scene of his death, no one besides Thompson will ever know the full truth.   While speculation has ranged from medical, to political, to personal reasons, I believe the reason goes much deeper and was a result of a loss of faith Thompson had in America and humanity in general, including himself.

                Many experiences occurring during Thompson’s early life in Kentucky would form the foundation for much of this dissatisfaction to be built up off of.  Due to being born into a lower middle class family, he was unable to buy himself out of the trouble many of his friends could.  Somewhat of a hellion, Thompson was known throughout his lifetime to enjoy drinking beer, smoking cigarettes and pot while visiting with friends. Once when the group he normally endulged with in high school was caught, Thompson was the only one who was barred from the high school graduation ceremony[1].  Singling him out due to monetary reasons was one of the first instances where Thompson felt that the way of life here was rigged, in that it was based upon hypocrisies and double standards, causing him to question many of the associated values[2].  Thompson’s interest in literature would lead him to find many authors at the time who felt a similar dissatisfaction with the American way of life.

                Among these influences, Soren Kierkegaard’s ideas were one of the most foundational to Thompson.  His supreme distrust for the capitalistic social structure of that was emerging in Denmark in his lifetime reflected heavily in Thompson’s writing.  In his personal diary, his thoughts would range from “wanting to shoot myself” for being the life and soul of a party[3] to cynicism about the fact that “man almost never avails himself to his freedoms, freedom of thought for instance; instead he demands freedom of speech”[4].  Kierkegaard felt much this were symptoms of what was wrong with his surroundings, the increasing difficulty “to ‘become who you are’”[5].

Kierkegaard’s seminal work, Fear & Trembling, would go onto influence Thompson to the point he would reference it in the name of his most influential work, Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas.  He would also be influenced by Kierkegaard’s use of a pseudonym, referencing himself as Johannes de silentio.  Here, through the voice of silentio, he would question the biblical story of Abraham and Issiac by raising various ethical issues surrounding this.  The questioning of the social structure at the time can be seen as parallel with Thompson’s questioning of the political structures of his time.

Thompson recognized this general motif of disgust with the capitalistic system that he had found in Kierkegaard in many of the contemporary American authors he identified with.   Possibly the biggest contemporary influence on Thompson was F. Scott Fitzgerald, whose novel The Great Gatsby would drive Thompson to become a writer himself.  He would use his typewriter to retype the entire novel repeatedly, in what has been described as Thompson’s attempt to learn the music of Fitzgerald and the flow of how he typed[6].  While Thompson felt Fitzgerald had called the double standard within our culture to task, he also felt he had not gone far enough, influencing Thompson to take the battle to the next level within his writing.

                Many authors would influence Thompson, ranging from more contemporary novelists like Jack Kerouac and Henry Miller, to more classical American authors like Mark Twain[7].  The realistic, and oftentimes vulgar and taboo style Miller would take with Tropic of Cancer was an obviously influential on the subjective approach Thompson would take in his reporting.  Another key work by Miller, The Air-Conditioned Nightmare, would echo many feeling Thompson had about what has become of American.  Miller speaks of a world in the making that fills him with dread, “suited for monomaniacs obsessed with the idea of progress—but a false progress, a progress which stinks.  It is a world cluttered with useless objects which men and women, in order to be exploited and degraded, are taught to regard as useful”[8].

                Thompson’s first major success was Hell’s Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga, published in 1966.  Here he took the role of a photo journalist, covering the Hells Angels motorcycle gang, primarily the Oakland chapter headed by Sonny Barger. Thompson quickly found the media hype surrounding the Angels to be just that, media hype.  What was referenced as evidence regarding the Hells Angels  in the media was based off a document that had come to be called the Lynch report[9].  It is now commonly agreed that this was a questionable piece of evidence involving many facts that have since been discovered to be fudged for various political reasons[10].  In reality, the Angels were to Thompson “urban outlaws with a rural ethic…their image of themselves derives mainly from Celluloid, from the Western movies and two-fisted TV shows that have taught them most of what they know about the society they live in”[11].

This disenchantment regarding the treatment of the Hell’s Angels serves as a reflection of Kierkegaard’s views on the media.  Thompson quoted Kierkegaard in this work as having felt, even during the time he lived, that the daily press was an institution that would grow more and more out of control[12]. Thompson saw a great truth revealed to him by the lack of objectivity in the Lynch report.  This would lead Thompson himself to reflect this with a more subjective approach to covering the Angels, never shading away from letting his own opinion spill out into the report.  This subjective approach to reporting would come to define Thompson’s style for the rest of his life.

The infamous two-day party thrown by Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters, where the Hell’s Angels were the guests of honor, occurred at the height of the San Francisco acid boom.  He would describe the mood of the party as fuelled by “very little marijuana, but plenty of LSD, which was then legal”[13].   Here Thompson would meet many influential personalities within the acid wave of 1960’s California, including Allen Ginsberg, Neal Cassady & Kesey himself[14].  Thompson’s tapes of his report of the whole Hell’s Angels group involved in an orgy with one woman, reportedly Cassady’s last wife, would go on to heavily influence Tom Wolfe in his groundbreaking book about the Merry Pranksters, The Electric Koolade Acid Test[15].

The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved, written in 1967 and published in 1970, was the report that Ralph Steadman is quoted as saying was the birth of Gonzo journalism[16].  The approach here would become so subjective that they would never cover the race, because “even from using our super-status seats and using 12-power glasses, there was no way to see what really happened”[17].  Instead Thompson told of his experiences in the crowd, never shying away from letting his opinion of events he was reporting be known.  Steadman drew sketches of the events, letting his own subjective voice become heard as well, depicting many of the patrons as monstrous and offending as possible[18].  This partnership and approach would come to last until Thompson’s death in 2005.

Thompson’s first wife described this as a very important era within his life on many levels[19].  From a social standpoint, it is here that Thompson became intertwined in the San Francisco acid wave and the following of psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane.  His involvement with this scene would give Thompson a momentary resurgence of faith in the American dream.  From a political standpoint, in his journey to the democratic convention in Chicago, Thompson’s belief would be crushed, though he would be drawn to involve himself in the process when he was among those attacked with force by officers for merely protesting at the 1968 Democratic Convention.  This event would have such an effect on Thompson, his first wife described it as being one of two times that she had ever witnessed him cry.

Though his dissatisfaction with the status quo would return after these experiences, all hope in the American dream had not yet been lost by Thompson.  He would attempt to change the system by putting himself in a position of power, running for Sherriff in his new and last place of residence, Woody Creek, Colorado[20].  This period of his life would be one where Thompson for once seemed to have everything together emotionally, and was focused on a clear goal.  Aspen, which was a haven for “drop out intellectuals” at the time, gave Thompson the support he needed and confidence that he was not alone in his thoughts[21].  Thompson would eventually loose the election by a narrow margin.

After the loss he would return west to cover a buggy race just outside of Las Vegas for Rolling Stone magazine, a partnership that would define the remainder of his career.  The work that would come out of the race, Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, would come to be Thompson’s magnum opus.  On the surface it is a multiple day drug binge by Thompson’s alter ego, Raoul Duke and his attorney Dr. Gonzo, the alter ego of Oscar Zeta Acosta.  In the midst of this drug crazed madness, there are many moments where the true purpose of the novel shines through: Thompson’s desire to rediscover the American dream.

The exert of the book Thompson was most particular about preserving the mood of in the movie adaptation was an interior monologue by Duke, speaking of the high water mark left from the acid wave of the 1960’s[22].  The monologue illustrates a central thesis of Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas: how little of a lasting effect the 1960’s had on our culture in the aspects Thompson felt most passionate about.  He would call Tim Leary & Ken Kesey and both of their groups to task for failing to even look into the future with both of their movements to publicize LSD[23].  He would also speak of a revelation that Las Vegas was the city that was the death of the American dream, or at least where it had gotten twisted and rotted away[24].  In the film adaptation Terry Gilliam would depict Duke, played by Johnny Depp, typing the monologue out in a hotel room as a series of corresponding visuals would illustrate many of the horrifying instances that had occurred since the 1960’s and in effect killing off the wave of hope that had built those few years in California[25].  The fallout he would later declare as “coming down on us at a pretty consistent rate since Sitting Bull’s time”[26].

Even after the assassinations of Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, all hope was not lost for Thompson in the political process.  He was once again enlisted by Rolling Stone, this time for a series of articles as their correspondent for the 1972 presidential campaign.  The incumbent, Richard Millhouse Nixon, was for Thompson a representation of “that dark, venal, and incurably violent side of the American character almost every other country in the world has learned to fear and despise”[27].  For a few months during the primaries as Thompson’s support of George McGovern grew, public distrust of all the other candidates shrunk away and McGovern easily won the nomination, despite his rebellion against party leaders.  Thompson’s faith would soon shrink away as Michael Eagleton, a senator from Missouri and a traditional Democratic Party man, was named the vice-presidential nominee.  It would eventually be revealed that Eagleton had suffered from depression he treated with shock therapy in the past, essentially winning the election for Nixon.

This would be “a mean, cold-blooded bummer” that Thompson was not ready for, and arguably never recovered from[28].  In the eyes of many critics nothing he would write after this would ever reach the success he had achieved during this period.  Most of his life was spent from this point on in Woody Creek, Colorado, living as a recluse.  Many who were close with him felt he had locked himself away in Colorado to avoid the caricature that had been created about him in the media and a comic strip[29].

It would take something really significant for Thompson to want to write about something other than football at the end of his life, and the September 11 terrorist attacks for Thompson was very significant[30].   Thompson would place the blame on men like George W. Bush and predicts nearly everything that will happen as a result of these attacks, from the wars on terror in Iraq and Afghanistan to the clamping down on freedom through the Patriot ACT[31].  Shortly after George W. Bush’s second inauguration Thompson took his own life and everything from a loss of hope as a result of Bush’s reelection to health concerns have been theorized as reasons[32].  While no one will ever fully be able to grasp and walk away with the reason why Thompson killed himself, if the loss of hope after Bush’s reelection was involved, it was just a symptom of what Thompson had lost faith in, the freedom of the American dream and the individual. 

The final note written by Thompson illustrates this loss of faith in society, and in himself as part of this social structure.  This note was given to his second wife on Valentine’s Day, a matter of days before his suicide.  In it he writes

No More Games.  No More Bombs.  No More Walking.  No More Fun.  No More Swimming.  67.  That is 17 years past 50.  17 more than I needed or wanted.  Boring.  I am always bitchy.  No Fun – for anybody.  67.  You are getting Greedy.  Act your old age.  Relax – This won’t hurt[33].

This final note echoes the accusations of Kenneth Rexroth’s memorial to Dylan Thomas Thou Shalt Not Kill.  It was society as a whole, me, you as well as Thompson and Thomas themselves, who are guilty.

You killed Him!  You killed him.

In your God damned Brooks Brothers suit,

You son of a bitch[34].

Works Cited

BBC News – Entertainment – Thompson ‘suicide note’ published.  8 Sept. 2005.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/entertainment/2F4227508.stm.

Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas.  Dir. Terry Gilliam.  Perf. Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro.  Universal Picture, 1998.

Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson.  Dir. Alex Gibney.  Perf. Johnny Depp and Tom Wolfe.  Magnolia Pictures, 2008.

Kierkegaard, Soren.  Fear and Trembling.  Tans. Alastair Hannay.  New York: Penguin Books, 1971.

Kierkegaard, Soren.  The Diary of Soren Kierkegaard.  New York: Citadel, 1998.

Miller, Henry.  The Air-Conditioned Nightmare.  New York: New Directions Books, 1970.

Rexroth, Kenneth.  “Thou Shalt Not Kill: A Memorial for Dylan Thomas”.  The Portable Beat Reader.  Ed. Ann Charters.  New York: Penguin Books, 1992.  233-241.

“Soren Kierkegaard." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 29 Nov 2009. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kierkegaard.

Thompson, Hunter S.  Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and other American stories.  New York: The Modern Library, 1996.

Thompson, Hunter S.  Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972.  New York: Warner Books, 1973.

Thompson, Hunter S.  Gonzo Papers, Vol 1: The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time.  New York: Summit Books, 1979.  Simon & Schuster, 2003.

Thompson, Hunter S.  Hell’s Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga.  New York: Ballantine Books, 1995.

Works Referenced

Fitzgerald, F. Scott.  The Great Gatsby.  New York: Scribner Paperback Fiction, 1995.

Kerouac, Jack.  On The Road.  New York: Penguin Books, 1991.

Miller, Henry.  The Tropic of Cancer.  New York: Groove Pres, 1961.

---

[1] Gonzo: The Life and Work of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson.  Dir. Alex Gibney.  Perf. Johnny Depp and Tom Wolfe.  Magnolia Pictures, 2008.

[2] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[3] Kierkegaard, Soren.  The Diary of Soren Kierkegaard.  New York: Citadel, 1998.  I

[4] The Diary of Kierkegaard, XIII

[5] “Soren Kierkegaard." Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 29 Nov 2009. http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/kierkegaard. 2

[6] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[7] Gonzo: The Life and Work.

[8] Miller, Henry.  The Air-Conditioned Nightmare.  New York: New Directions Books, 1970.  24.

[9] Thompson, Hunter S.  Hell’s Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga.  New York: Ballantine Books, 1995.  21-32.

[10] Hell’s Angels, 23.

[11] Hell’s Angels, 260.

[12] Hell’s Angels, 21.

[13] Hell’s Angels, 229.

[14] Hell’s Angels, 226-262.

[15] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[16] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[17] Thompson, Hunter S.  Gonzo Papers, Vol 1: The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time.  New York: Summit Books, 1979.  Simon & Schuster, 2003.

[18] Gonzo Papers.

[19] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[20] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[21] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[22] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[23] Thompson, Hunter S.  Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and other American stories.  New York: The Modern Library, 1996.  178-180

[24] Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas(Thompson), 180.

[25] Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas.  Dir. Terry Gilliam.  Perf. Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Toro.  Universal Picture, 1998.

[26] Thompson, Hunter S.  Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972.  New York: Warner Books, 1973.  394.

[27] Fear & Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972, 416

[28] Fear & Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972, 417

[29] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[30] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[31] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[32] Gonzo: The Life & Work

[33] BBC News – Entertainment – Thompson ‘suicide note’ published.  8 Sept. 2005.  http://news.bbc.co.uk/entertainment/2F4227508.stm.

[34] Rexroth, Kenneth.  “Thou Shalt Not Kill: A Memorial for Dylan Thomas”.  The Portable Beat Reader.  Ed. Ann Charters.  New York: Penguin Books, 1992.  233-241.

Even though most of this weekend was spent reading secondary sources on German aesthetic tradition or preparing aspects of my new film, I still managed to get out Saturday night and have a ton of fun with old friends I don't see enough anymore.  There seem to be more and more of these friends in my life, but I must not let myself get down over my memories of the past growing further and further away.  I need to keep my sights set on my goals, and my true telos in what I do, the progression of history and the evolution of not just my own, but human consciousness in general.  But I digress, Saturday night was excellent and just like Sol said to Max in Pi, sometimes you just need to take a bath and let your mind go....no acting like I am getting some kinda spiritual enlightenment out of it to give myself reason to do it every night, just good old fashioned purposeless fun for a night...

Even though I'm not much for drinking and partying anymore, at least on the level I used to, it still serves its purpose.  It is good to look back on photos of yourself smiling with old friends...

Second 4th of July in a row with great friends, can't ask for much more.  Hard to believe it was over a year ago now that I went to Camp Zoe for probably the last time...It was such a beautiful experience and I will cherish those memories forever...

Happy fourth of July everyone, blow some shit up for Hunter S. Thompson!