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Where does Thompson fit in these categories? How and/or why?
Respond by Sunday, April 1, 4 p.m.
14 comments:
Thompson doesn't disclaimer his piece for discrepancies until the end, but before that it is assumable that the dialogue's and scenes of events may not be all exact. To recall one conversation verbatim is hard in itself, and to recall multiple conversations over a course of a few days, with the addition of the altered memory state alcohol causes, well, I can believe these conversations happened, but maybe not as glamorous.
I think Thompson's piece is literary journalism/ creative non-fiction. He "uses the facts as his clay." Steadman and him set out to cover the drunken mess of an intolerant Middle American state during the event of the glorious Kentucky Derby. Thompson also adds in straight facts; such as newspaper headlines and current events.
Thompson exemplifies what the cartoon's point is. Tell the truth as honest and accurate as you possibly can.
The cartoon says, “most of us did not take notes or record the conversations we had when we were 8. So we accept that childhood dialogue is not exact.” I feel that this goes for any conversation or encounter that we’ve had in the past, whether it was yesterday, last week, or years ago. Thompson’s “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved” takes place over the course of a few days so the dialogue in this story can’t entirely be the exact words that were stated in his various conversations and even some of the descriptions may not be precisely as he remembered. Thompson seems to get as many facts as he can right and the ideas in his story are true. He tells the story as he remembered it. He got to “the core of the scene” and developed the story around the core as truthfully as he was able to.
thompson is a fantasist. is there really a restaurant called ptomaine village (look up the word ptomaine)? did he really almost crush a volkswagen full of nuns? how about macing a waiter? the derby experience is filtered through his hyperbolic language and juiced-up imagination.
I think Hunter Thompson fits into cartoon number 7 where the cartoonist says "But it seems unlikely that Karr got all the details exactly right when describing an April Day in Texas in 1964. Rather she got at the 'core of the scene.'" Thompson was assigned to cover the Kentucky Derby, an event that thousands of sports reporters cover for their publications.Thompson could have done your standard sports coverage of the event with statistics, numbers, and interviews but took the other path of getting the real story of the derby, the core of the scene. Instead of covering the races he reported the audience and their horrific antics. I feel Thompson's decision to focus on the crowd and their behavior was his effort in covering the "core of the scene" which was unique for sports reporting. The core is where he focuses on is the wild drunkards who are pissing on themselves and vomiting all over the place. Thompson built his story around the crowd and their actions with straight facts and observations. So as the cartoon states Thompson didn't get all the details right in covering the derby because he didn't even talk about the derby regarding the races and horses but focused on what he felt mattered.
Although some elements of his journalism were pure fantasy, Thompson’s style of “gonzo” journalism is so well known that “The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved” is above a disclaimer– such a warning would embarrass the outlaw aspect of his work. I think he would see it as offending the readers who do get the joke. It’d be like Stephen Colbert reminding his viewers before each program, “Remember, I’m really not a Republican.”
That being said, I think this particular piece would fit into Gessner and Roorbach’s writing-style category of the Ruth Reichl-esque disclaimer, “Everything here is true, but may not be entirely factual. I learned early that the most important thing in life is a good story.” (Not being familiar with her work, I looked her up and now have a delicious Avgolemono Soup recipe.) Thompson’s coverage of the Derby was telling the truth as he saw it and experienced it, but overall aims to capture the feeling or ethos of the experience, not worrying about documenting and fact-checking the details one would find in a precision journalism article. It gets to the core of the scene.
One example of something true but non-factual was the reference to the Ptomaine Village “hamburger palace” near their hotel. Ptomaine refers to any of a group of amine compounds of unpleasant taste and odor formed in putrefying animal and vegetable matter and formerly thought to cause food poisoning. Obviously, someone would not name their restaurant after putrefied rotting meat and food poisoning. This may be non-factual, but authors change the name of people and places all the time to protect people’s identities. In this case, it was hilarious.
Also very funny was the perfectly timed dialogue between Thompson and Steadman, who recounts to Thompson that the author sprayed mace at a server after, of course, too many drinks at the restaurant with his own brother, and everyone ran out crying with burning skin. Is that factual? Was Thompson that outrageous? He can’t recall the event happening, so we are taking Steadman’s word for it. Does Thompson believe he did it? Yes, because he started remembering it and specific details once prompted. So it is hard to tell if that is true or not, but it is very funny, and very in character to Thompson’s general portrayal of himself.
Like Gessner and Roorbach’s cartoon advised, Thompson is certainly artistic, but also is accurate in the way that if you believe something strongly enough, to you it is true. He certainly doesn’t worry about the “fact police” and bluntly, just makes stuff up sometimes. He also utilizes some of the “Colombo technique” described, with all the shrugging and stumbling. With his transcription of his innermost thoughts, and lack of objectivity, Thompson’s coverage is more upfront and honest than traditional journalism, something that is entirely factual but may not be very true.
Hunter S. Thompson's Gonzo journalism technique fits perfectly into the cartoon description of creative non-fiction. The part that relates most to the cartoon's description is comparison between Thompson's description of covering the story to the his writing as Nixon. Like the cartoon says, debate about how much is actually true in creative non-fiction has been brought up constantly and the author is usually ridiculed for it. Thompson obviously was not Nixon. But in his writing of the story of Nixon's downfall, but with his insertion of Nixon's first person account, the recreation of dialogue.
Obviously, Thompson was accurate and truthful when writing the background to the Watergate Scandal and Nixon's demise. By adding in the dialogue between Nixon and Ziegler, the piece elevates to some type of "new" journalism experience. He's fabricating the entire dialogue up, but the dialogue acts like more of a compass than solely fiction.
I couldn’t find the story on the Kentucky Derby; instead I read the other Hunter S. Thompson story regarding the resignation of Richard Nixon. I thought this piece was still relevant to the cartoon. The point being that important details weren’t fabricated.
From what I read of the other comments posted here was that Thompson used this technique of weaving actual headlines and his own account, which he also did in the “The Scum Also Rises.” It served as a stable point of how the resignation was panning out. Thompson fits into the cartoon with getting basic facts correct.
It’s true and documented that Nixon, on his last day, boarded the helicopter and swiveled around. Thompson says that here Nixon lost his balance, but this isn’t talked about in history and I can say that this was the first time I was hearing of this incident. This poses the question: did this actually happen? With the amount of Nixon criticism, and that time he felt he wasted in the pressroom, he could of fabricated the loss of balance to solidify this idea of a broken man on broken ground. However, this little detail is non-essential if it was real or not.
On the other hand, it’s assumed that the conversation Nixon is having with Ziegler is made up, and this is where it gets tricky as the cartoon has a different idea for this sort of thing. The cartoon has urged to “be upfront and honest” with any story. This entire conversation wasn’t even an attempt. So it’s half and half with Thompson, but he’s a unique writer and this adds to the quality of the piece and his sardonic tone.
Thompson’s piece fits in with the cartoon describing that information may be accurate, but not true. As mentioned, Thompson is a fantasist. this may lead him to fabricate some of the actual events that occurred. This is also applicable to the dialogue he writes. I found it interesting that the cartoon calls it an "acceptable lie," considering Thompson may not be lying at all.
In addition, he fits into the cartoon describing the genre of creative non-fiction. In the beginning of his story, the meaning behind term “Gonzo journalism” is described rather than creative non-fiction.
Thompson's writing style fits perfectly into the nonfiction cartoon. Similar to what Michael has already pointed out, I believe Thompson's Kentucky Derby story, along with much of his writing, falls best under the seventh point in the cartoon that discusses nonfiction as portraying "the core" of a scene instead of ensuring all of the facts and details are correct. Thompson gives the reader an entirely different perspective on the derby than any other reporter had done. He took note of the characters attending and the atmosphere of the area so that the reader could imagine it in their head and feel as if they were actually there. To me, that requires much more talent and effort than fact checking and confirming exact dialogue and names of restaurants. Thompson captures the era of the derby the best he could without physically writing down every conversation and detail along the way. He told the accounts of what he experienced over a few days in a dramatized manner. There were parts of the story that were fantasy, but Thompson's main purpose of reporting the truth was still in tact so I believe he accomplished what the cartoon was stating, which was "try your best to be both accurate and artistic."
Hunter S. Thompson is known for the creation of Gonzo journalism. Gonzo journalism is known as a style of writing that refrains from using an objective perspective and often may have a first-person narrative. This is similar to creative non-fiction because you tell the details of the story but also add your own insight and subjective opinion. The facts of the story were true, but were intertwined with satire and figurative language, and his own ideas. He is adding a creative touch the world of non fiction. I think it makes fact much more interesting, however it may alter the meaning of the word "fact".
At one point in the comic it talks about being honest and upfront. Clearly Thompson fits into this category because he explains how drunk he was at the Derby. Thompson only goes by what he finds in his notebook. I think because he was outrageously drunk he began to make things up in his head about what takes place at the Derby and where they eat, who they see, what they do. On the other hand, Thompson's bag that says something about being a photographer for Playboy. In this case clearly Thompson is not telling the truth but uses it to his advantage in his story. In the comic it also says that every detail and quote don't need to be confirmed. So does that mean Thompson's conversation with "Jimbo" even happened? After reading the comic, I need to take Thompson's story with a grain of salt.
Roorbach and Gessner's cartoon does it's best to explain the irony of "creative non-fiction." When two people are thrown into whatever situation, they are going to have two different experiences. No one should argue about writers and their creative non-fiction because they write from memory and may elaborate to grab the reader's attention and to transport them into a different world.
Thompson's work is a great example of what the cartoon explains. He even has a way of telling the reader that what he writes comes from himself daydreaming. He wont say if directly but it is implied. His article is filled with himself rambling of crazy over-the-top ideas. For example, his thought of mace. It gives the story a fresh angle and humorous angle. And although he obviously has a lot of fantasy elements in his piece, his facts about the Kentucky Derby (like how long the race lasted, the people) remained to be truthful.
Hunter S. Thompson using Gonzo journalism as a technique that involved self-mythologizing meaning the relaying of information that could be accurate but not true, relatable to the cartoon. He mixes the use of headlines into the story and dramatizes what he ”I,” has experienced. This creative non-fiction has insight and opinion. Also, where dialogue happens, in the cartoon it states that “most of us did not take notes.. etc,” and there is much dialogue in Thompson’s writing. It isn’t word for word. Thompson gets the “core of the scene” and uses description with “honesty,” his experience.
I think Thompson fits into the category best that gets to the core of the scene. His writing addresses all the major aspects and facts of the situation, but he defintiely takes creative liberty with things that are non-essential to the truthfulness of the story. It's also assumed that some of the conversations and interactions may not have taken place in exactly this manner, however Thompson clearly does his best to reconstruct the feel of experiences even if specifics may not be spot on. Then again, there are incidents in his writing that seem way too far out to be true. However, I think these over the top experiences still serve a purpose in directing the reader and portraying a message without compromising the story or making them obselete.
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