>>>>>>>Now two movies I can think of that were as good as the books but obviously due to different mediums, for different reasons:
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>One Flew Over the Cukoo's nest. and Catch 22.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>Two books I plan to read some day. The movies are cult by now. Though, the Nest is pretty much a documentary.
>>>>>
>>>>>After (or before) you read Cuckoos Nest read 'Sometimes a great notion'....
>>>>
>>>>Over the baby's crib, his mother had put a plaque reading "Blessed are the meek". His father replaced it with one that read "Never give an inch."
>>>>
>>>>One of the greatest moments in modern fiction that has stuck with me for over 40 years.
>>>
>>>I read 'Sometimes a great notion' before 'Cuckoos nest' and, AFAIR, enjoyed it more. Though I have to admit those are the only two KK books that I've read.....
>>>
>>>Some years ago a friend of mine swore he came across Ken Kesey and a couple of other guys with an old camper van parked up in a layby in Wales.........
>>
>>If you haven't read it, I recommend Tom Wolfe's The Electric Kool-aid Acid Test. Any non- fiction Wolfe has written is among my favorite stuff of all time. This particular work is his account of Kesey and the Merry Pranksters on the Magic Bus with the Grateful Dead and whole lot of Owsley acid.
>
>I've read it. In fact it must still be on a shelf here somewhere. Maybe I'll dust it down and read it again.....
>Re-reading Hunter S T's 'Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas' is already on my vacation list....

Despite his well deserved reputation as a wild man -- much of it self promoted -- Thompson was a really good journalist. I define that as someone who can get the facts straight, in order, writes well, and sometimes brings insight that would not come to the normal person. He had a lot of issues, no doubt. He embraced drugs and alcohol in a way that eventually did him in. His writing went bad as he slipped more and more into the gonzo persona he had created. When he was young and at his best, though, there was no one else in his category.

If the current polls are reliable... Nixon will be re-elected by a huge majority of Americans who feel he is not only more honest and more trustworthy than George McGovern, but also more likely to end the war in Vietnam. The polls also indicate that Nixon will get a comfortable majority of the Youth Vote. And that he might carry all fifty states... This may be the year when we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it — that we are really just a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable. The tragedy of all this is that George McGovern, for all his mistakes... understands what a fantastic monument to all the best instincts of the human race this country might have been, if we could have kept it out of the hands of greedy little hustlers like Richard Nixon. McGovern made some stupid mistakes, but in context they seem almost frivolous compared to the things Richard Nixon does every day of his life, on purpose... Jesus! Where will it end? How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President?

-- From "Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 1972"

I saw him speak at Northwestern in 1975. This being the love, peace, and granola era, the time of mass insurrection and disrespect of authority, the place was packed. Right at the beginning some guy in one of the front rows tossed something to HST. He looked at it and said, "It's a f*****g amyl, man." And downed it. So that was sort of the atmosphere which framed his remarks. He had a high tolerance and made reasonable sense. After his presentation a huge group of students swarmed around him, about evenly distributed between journalism majors and apprentice crazies. One of my buddies who went to the talk with me asked him if he would like to come over and do some acid. (Compared to a lot of my college friends I was about as wild and crazy as Harry Reid, and never did psychedelics). HST said thanks but no thanks, not tonight. A sizzling blonde who was in my history class was lingering around on the periphery, an apparent arrangement between them already made. Better than acid, I'm sure.