Hunter and the Haunted

Hunter S. Thompson, the "Gonzo" journalist known for Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, The Rum Diaries, The Curse of Lono and much other writing for Rolling Stone, ESPN and elsewhere, died yesterday at his own hand, either a suicide or perhaps an accident. To be honest, I'd expected something like this for awhile. He was a larger-than-life figure for some time, a legendary substance abuser and gun enthusiast of violence and conviction and piercing insight that somehow married well with surrealistic and nightmarish descriptive powers. He was not a man I admired, but a man whose work I admired. If it was a suicide, I don't condemn the guy for it, but it's sad that he would apparently feel he didn't have more to give, or more he could take.

I guess as much as I respected ADD's thoughts on Thompson on his blog, this would be a dividing line with us. I don't think of this as a "sad, sick fucking world," or if it is, it's a lot of other things as well. I would assume the sad and sick refers really to those who populate the world rather than the world itself, and I have to think there are plenty of joyful, healthy, kind people even if they often go unseen, unheralded, taken for granted. I don't discredit Thompson's work: there's a need for a jaundiced eye, for a subversive heart, a biting wit. The town crier often finds himself, at the end, alone, and maybe that's how Thompson felt. I don't know.

In a way, though, his death comes at a fortuitous time for me. I know how that sounds, but let me explain. It's been a tough three day weekend full of broken plans, setbacks, delays, nightmares, and not facing any adults the whole time. Somewhat coincidentally, I was listening to another suicide, Elliott Smith, and his last cd From a Basement on the Hill, with cheery numbers like "A Distorted Reality Is Now a Necessity To Be Free", and the good thing is that none of this broke me. I could say I've been kinda bummed this weekend, and that's about it. So that feels good. Sometimes you don't know what kind of reserves and resilience you have.

Wrote pages 7, 10 and 16 of Superunknown last night and then watched a bunch of Arrested Development episodes on dvd. Discussed the book a bit with my editor and publisher, and one of the setbacks referenced above is that my book is kind of dependent on how some other books coming out first from this publisher do. So, the stuff I've been working on all this time might not even come out, and I can only be optimistic and look at it as, well, writing experience, even if no one ends up seeing it. What else can you do? The editor liked some of what I was doing with the characters and said some stuff "could be dropped altogether," so until I know just what that is, it's a little difficult to proceed, you know? Depending on how soon he replies to my request for elaboration, I may just have to shift over to one of the creator-owned projects for a while.

Finished The Fortress of Solitude, and it's such an excellent novel. I was pleasantly surprised how little the superpowered ring had to do with it. It leads to some interesting episodes but really doesn't define the character or control his life. It's a means to an end, a symbol needed to be discarded in order to finally be at peace with oneself. I could see this as a really good movie, too, a funkier and more cerebral Unbreakable, with great soul music.