Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Other American Stories - (Modern Library (Hardcover)) by Hunter S Thompson (Hardcover)

About the Book

Thompson's legendary tale of excess. The long-awaited feature film promises to be one of the most talked-about movies of the season, starring Johnny Depp.

Book Synopsis

The 50th-anniversary edition of the classic, savagely comic account of a trip to Las Vegas that came to represent what happened to America in the 1960s--and a founding document of "gonzo journalism"--featuring the original artwork by Ralph Steadman and a new introduction by Caity Weaver

First published in Rolling Stone magazine in 1971, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is told through Hunter S. Thompson's story of an assignment he undertook with his attorney to visit Las Vegas and "check it out." The book stands as the final word on the highs and lows of that decade, one of the defining works of our time, and a stylistic and journalistic tour de force. As Christopher Lehmann-Haupt wrote in The New York Times, it has "a kind of mad, corrosive prose poetry that picks up where Norman Mailer's An American Dream left off and explores what Tom Wolfe left out."

This 50th-anniversary Modern Library edition features Ralph Steadman's original drawings, a new introduction by New York Times writer Caity Weaver, and three companion pieces selected by Thompson: "Jacket Copy for Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas," "Strange Rumblings in Aztlan," and "The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved."

Review Quotes

"[A book] in the zonked, road-writing tradition of Jack Kerouac."--The New Republic, 1972

"A scorching, epochal sensation!"--Tom Wolfe

"What goes on in these pages makes Lenny Bruce seem angelic."--The New York Times, 1972

"He is really much more than a journalist. Not a journalist at all, but one who sees--a seer."--Edward Abbey

About the Author

Hunter S. Thompson was born in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1937 and died in Colorado in 2005. He contributed regularly to a wide variety of publications but is probably best known for his work as national-affairs correspondent for Rolling Stone, in which Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 originally appeared. He originated "gonzo journalism," in which the reporter is a part of the story. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was made into a major motion picture, directed by Terry Gilliam and starring Johnny Depp.