The world owed Hunter Thompson.
Abandoned, to rot in jail.
'The swines, I'll even the scales.'
He never deviated from that goal throughout his writing career.
He fucked over the corporations whenever he felt he could get away with it.
A man of principles, he filed the story.
But he made sure to use as many resources as possible around him, that cost the corporation.
Swines.
Books edited, by someone else, copy editors, editors, CEO's, book publishers.
Of course, he wrote them.
One book deal, the publisher broke into Owl Farm, stole all the notes, some written on used toilet paper, shopping bags and on rolling joint paper.
Hunter still got paid and a book out of the deal.
When the going gets tough, let the desperate break into your basement, 'and let those swines file the story.'
Hunter learnt at an early age that he would never be one of them.
From an early age, the awakening that he was always going to be
white trash among polite company had moulded the writer.
He became a product of polite society.
'Good to have him around, but when we are getting the heat, let Hunter be the fall guy.'
Some of the best reporting to come out of Vietnam was from Hunter.
His description of the waiting staff at The Hotel Continental was a lullaby, and showed his true roots, his true working-class white trash roots.
He could relate to the common person, the janitor, the waiter, the stripper, the dope dealer, the gun runner, the Hell's Angels.
There's the rub.
Hunter never deviated from the self-destructing, star blazing, scorching, maverick, right stuff path.
Some might say the drugs got the better of him.
Others might say that righting a few wrongs seemed as natural as exiting through the window and avoiding another hotel bill.
Who hasn't done a runner?
It takes balls.
Trust me, you don't become an intrepid international feature writer if you haven't done a runner. What you do become is a copy writer, in some newsroom, living off the glories of those 'real' reporters filing stories from squalid dengue ridden cities that would get the fear and loathing coursing through anyone's veins.
It just might make them throw their job in, sell their car, and buy a direct flight to Bangkok, like Gonzo photographer Philip Blenkinsop did.
His The Cars that Ate Bangkok; a true and terrifying account in the age of the automobiles, is a total rip-off of a Hunter production, right down to the logo of the hand gripping a snake.
'You still don't get it,' Philip would say to reporters on the release of his book back in '97.
'Hunter Thompson,' I said.
'You fucking got it.'
I was the first and only reporter to have got it. It only took me two decades to find the right answer.
The Rum Diaries was Hunter's Great Gatsby.
It's a masterpiece in the tradition of the Expat Writers, from George Orwell (Down and Out in London and Paris), Henry Miller (All his books) Jake Needham (The Big Mango), Laurence Ozborne (Bangkok Daze) and Vanya Vetto (Tramadol Nights: Bali Dreaming.)
Anyone who quotes me, wears outrageous seventies glasses, a wig, mumbles, brags about my books, as if they are next of kin in my lineage of great Gonzo writing, are all imposters and are not welcome at Owl Farm.
That memorandum was stuck up on Hunter's fridge for future pretenders.
Luckily, I was never invited to Owl Farm.
'I still had three hours to kill and needed to cash a check.'
Fucking genius, this guy is welcome, he produced a quote I was fond of.
Thanks Hunter.
It's all about the research. The research... and the paybacks, of course.
