Posts Tagged ‘Gonzo’
“Explaining a joke is like dissecting a frog. You understand it better but the frog dies in the process”*…
Actually, sometimes it does: “Classic Jokes Explained”
[image above, from here]
* E.B. White
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As we fiddle with our funny bones, we might bake a laced cake for a writer who never explained his jokes: journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson; he was born in Louisville on this date in 1929. The author of Hell’s Angels, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 is widely credited as the creator of the Gonzo school of journalism (an extreme form of New Journalism in which the reporter isn’t simply present, he/she is central), and widely remembered for his love of inebriates and guns, and for his hate of authoritarianism in general and Richard Nixon in particular.
…the massive, frustrated energies of a mainly young, disillusioned electorate that has long since abandoned the idea that we all have a duty to vote. This is like being told you have a duty to buy a new car, but you have to choose immediately between a Ford and a Chevy.
– Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 (1973)
“He do the Police in different voices”*…
Police blotters aren’t tasked with remembering criminals or crafting their deeds into a hardboiled narrative. When newspapers can only spare a sentence to describe a raft of offenses, fitting the who, what, where, when and why into a roundup of the cops and courts beat’s leftovers is hard enough.
The magic of police blotters, however, is that a sentence alone can be mightily revealing…
For example:
California
A resident reported a large light in the sky. It was the moon.
— 2002, reported in the San Jose Mercury News
9:53 p.m. When a roommate moved out, he took several unweaned kittens with him.
— August 13, 2013, reported in the Arcata Eye (which was profiled in the San Francisco Chronicle for its police blotter)
Nevada
8:30 p.m. — A caller in the vicinity of Bloomfield Graniteville Road and Bush Road reported an “illegal wedding,” with a PA system.
12:25 a.m. — A 911 caller on the 14000 block of Meadow Drive stated that “There is electromagnetic radar, and she has no emergency at this time.”
— June 2, 2014, as reported by the Union
Virginia
A resident reported that she and her sister had become involved in an argument that became more heated when the topic of religion arose. The sister decided she would call a friend or a cab and leave the residence.
— June 29, 2012, as reported by the Vienna Police Department
A state-by-state sampling of the poetry of police blotters at “All crimes are local: America’s police blotters, indexed.”
* Betty Higden, of her adopted foundling son Sloppy, in Charles Dickens’ Our Mutual Friend : “You mightn’t think it, but Sloppy is a beautiful reader of a newspaper. He do the Police in different voices.” “He do the Police in different voices” was T.S. Eliot’s original tile for the poem we know as “The Waste Land.”
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As we tune our scanners, we might bake a laced cake for journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson; he was born in Louisville on this date in 1929. The author of Hell’s Angels, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 is widely credited as the creator of the Gonzo school of journalism (an extreme form of New Journalism in which the reporter isn’t simply present, he/she is central), and widely remembered for his love of inebriates and guns, and for his hate of authoritarianism in general and Richard Nixon in particular.
…the massive, frustrated energies of a mainly young, disillusioned electorate that has long since abandoned the idea that we all have a duty to vote. This is like being told you have a duty to buy a new car, but you have to choose immediately between a Ford and a Chevy.
– Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 (1973)
“Literature adds to reality, it does not simply describe it”*…
It’s straight out of the pages of science fiction: a “wearable” book, which uses temperature controls and lighting to mimic the experiences of a story’s protagonist, has been dreamed up by academics at MIT.
The book, explain the researchers, senses the page a reader is on, and changes ambient lighting and vibrations to “match the mood”. A series of straps form a vest which contains a “heartbeat and shiver simulator”, a body compression system, temperature controls and sound.
“Changes in the protagonist’s emotional or physical state trigger discrete feedback in the wearable [vest], whether by changing the heartbeat rate, creating constriction through air pressure bags, or causing localised temperature fluctuations,” say the academics…
Read more at The Guardian and at the MIT Sensory Fiction project page, then watch this short demo:
email readers click here for video
* C.S. Lewis
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As we feel the protagonist’s pain, we might spare a thought for Hunter S. Thompson; he died, by his own hand, on this date in 2005. Father of the “Gonzo” school of reportage, in which reporters so involve themselves in the action they’re covering that they become central figures in the stories, HST was a pillar of the New Journalism movement (though he’d surely be horrified to hear it put that way).
The true voice of Thompson is revealed to be that of American moralist … one who often makes himself ugly to expose the ugliness he sees around him
– Hari Kunzru
Getting small…
Over the years, (R)D has contemplated miniature paintings, miniature Biblical temples, miniature pencil carvings, even miniature golf…
Now, something even closer to your correspondent’s heart: miniature books.
Miniature books (generally defined as not exceeding 100 mm [3.9 inches] in height, width or thickness) first came into fashion in the late Fifteenth Century, when the tiny tomes were produced as novelties. Soon, printers began producing the small volumes to show off their skills.
Hungarian collector Jozsef Tari has been collecting miniature books and newspapers since 1972; his library now includes more than 4500 volumes of Lilliputian literature.
More on miniature books and Tari’s collection at Web Urbanist (from whence, the photos above).
As we reach for a smaller duster, we might bake a laced cake for journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson; he was born in Louisville on this date in 1929. The author of Hell’s Angels, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, and Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 is widely credited as the creator of the Gonzo school of journalism (an extreme form of New Journalism in which the reporter isn’t simply present, he/she is central), and widely remembered for his love of inebriates and guns and for his hate of authoritarianism in general and Richard Nixon in particular.
…the massive, frustrated energies of a mainly young, disillusioned electorate that has long since abandoned the idea that we all have a duty to vote. This is like being told you have a duty to buy a new car, but you have to choose immediately between a Ford and a Chevy.
– Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 (1973)
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