My review of Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967 (Gonzo Letters), Hunter S. Thompson

The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967 by Hunter S. Thompson
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I read this, after reading Hell's Angels, which I enjoyed. He saved every letter. Passionate, intelligent and impulsive, his letter writing is up there with his best published writing. I highlighted a lot of quotes in it. A complex person, not easily categorized, he was a member of the NRA, a fierce opponent of the Vietnam war, a friend of Ginsberg, an Air Force vet, able and willing to offend with language, afraid of a fascist future, in the form of Reagan and Nixon. He loved and hated. He probably suffered from manic depression. He'd land big publishing contracts and then stop writing. He was terrible at the business of writing, losing money and struggling to find publishers, agents and editors with whom he could work. He really, really liked guns. He wore his heart on his sleeve, as they say. He was really funny. I would have liked to have met the guy. I saved quite a few to-read books that he mentioned, and immediately jumped to one of his favorite authors after this, William Styron, but a book that was published after Thompson died, _Darkness Visible: A Memoir of Madness_. They had a bit in common; self-destructive tendencies, a cessation of passion when the darkness came. There are singular people in the world. I liked this quote, in response to a 14-year-old boy who read Hells Angels and wanted to join the gang as soon as he could; "When I was 14 I was a wild, half-wit punk who caused a lot of trouble and wanted to tear the world in half if for no other reason than it didn’t seem to fit me too well. Now, looking back on it, I don’t think I’d change much of what I did in those days … but I’ve also learned at least one crucially important thing since then. And that’s the idea of making your own pattern, not falling into grooves that other people made. Remember that if you can do one thing better than anybody it’ll make life a hell of a lot easier for you in this world—which is a pretty mean world, when you get to know it, and a lot of people in it can ride big Harleys … especially in California. The best of the Angels—the guys you might want to sit down and talk to—have almost all played that game for a while and then quit for something better. The ones who are left are almost all the kind who can’t do anything else, and they’re not much fun to talk to. They’re not smart, or funny, or brave, or even original. They’re just Old Punks, and that’s a lot worse than being a Young Punk. They’re not even happy; most of them hate the lives they lead, but they can’t afford to admit it because they don’t know where else to go, or what else to do. That’s what makes them mean … and it also makes them useless, because there’s already a big oversupply of mean bastards in this world."

Thompson, Hunter S.. Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967 (Gonzo Letters) (pp. 627-628). Random House Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

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