GonzoToday
  • Pages
    • Front Page
    • Featured content
    • The GonzoToday Interview
    • Commentary
    • Poetry
    • ART
    • News
    • Travel
  • Music
    • Music videos
    • Music Reviews
  • Columns
    • The Publisher Pontificates
    • Greetings from Scranton
    • The Vinyl Vault
  • Fiction
    • Books
    • Short Stories
    • FAN Fiction
  • About
    • Our staff
    • About GonzoToday.com
    • Mission Statement
  • Submissions
  • Log In

GonzoToday Poetry Editor Ron Whitehead inducts Hunter S. Thompson into Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame

January 29, 2015 Clayton Luce News 0

Photographs by Jinn; Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 2.5.
Tweet

On January 28, 2015 Ron Whitehead inducted Hunter S. Thompson into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame. The ceremony took place, with a standing room only audience, at The Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning in Lexington, Kentucky. After Hunter’s induction, Wendell Berry became the first living author to be inducted. KET, Kentucky’s PBS affiliate, will air the one hour program in February. Here’s what Ron Whitehead had to say by way of honoring his friend Hunter S. Thompson.

If life is a dream, as some suggest, sometimes beautiful sometimes desperate, then Hunter S. Thompson’s work is the terrible saga of the ending of time for The American Dream. With its action set at the heart of darkness of American materialist culture, with war as perpetual background, playing on the television, Hunter S. Thompson, like the prophets of old, shows how we, through greed and power lust, have already gone over the edge. As Jack Kerouac, through his brilliant oeuvre, breathed hope into international youth culture, Thompson shows how the ruling power elite is not about to share what it controls with idealists yearning for a world of peace, love and understanding.

“Back at the motel we talked for a while about America, the South, England – just relaxing a bit before dinner. There was no way either of us could have known, at the time, that it would be the last normal conversation we would have. From that point on, the weekend became a vicious, drunken nightmare. We both went completely to pieces. The main problem was my prior attachment to Louisville, which naturally led to meeting with old friends, relatives…many of whom were in the process of falling apart, going mad, plotting divorces, cracking up under the strain of terrible debts or recovering from bad accidents.

Right in the middle of the whole frenzied Derby action, a member of my own family had to be institutionalized. This added a certain amount of strain to the situation, and since poor Steadman had no choice but to take whatever came his way, he was subjected to shock after shock.”
On February 20th it will be 10 years since Hunter died.

Right after his death I wrote Hunter Shaman Thompson is Dead, A Tribute. When I was invited to be Hunter’s presenter at his induction into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame I asked Ralph Steadman if he’d like for me to share any words.
Here’s Ralph’s reply:

“Hunter was always so perceptive and kind! He referred to my drawings as ‘Filthy Scribblings!’ – and also that I should not write – or I would ‘bring shame on my Family!’ His middle name is STOCKTON!!! He was wiser than any Shaman – so I wouldn’t hang that around his neck!! That would really bring shame….Enough already!!!!
OK. RALPH….”

“When the going gets weird the weird turn pro.”

We must look beyond the life of the artist to the body of work itself. That is the measure of success. Like those who have re-examined George Orwell’s 1984 to find a multi-layered literary masterpiece, we must look deep into Hunter S. Thompson’s work and discover the multi-layered messages. His books, especially the early ones and his letters, are literary masterpieces equal to the best writing ever produced.

“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved boy, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming ‘Wow! What a Ride!'”

Ron Whitehead

January 28, 2015

Share :

  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window) Facebook
  • Click to share on X (Opens in new window) X

Related

  • gonzotoday
  • hall of fame
  • hunter s thompson
  • kentucky
  • Ron Whitehead
Previous

Thanks Again Ralph Steadman!

Next

Fear and Appreciation at the Carnegie Center

SUBSCRIBE TO GONZOTODAY.COM

SEARCH OUR ARCHIVES

Support GonzoToday.com by buying our books... thanks!

or purchase directly through Amazon.com

Bobby “Blue” Bland – Turn on Your Love Light

Featured Content

  • Val Kilmer: Farewell to a True Artist

    April 2, 2025 0
  • WHAT IF Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens & The Big Bopper Lived?

    January 29, 2025 0
  • Gonzo Today’s Facebook Page Has Been Hacked

    January 16, 2025 0
  • Mike Tyson vs Jake Paul: Fake or Real

    November 15, 2024 0
  • Trump Again. Now What?

    November 6, 2024 0
  • Trump Wins: What Does That Mean?

    November 6, 2024 0
  • A Sensation of Intense Disgust, but Don’t Give Up

    November 5, 2024 0
  • Muddy Creek & Co: Fighters & Lovers

    August 29, 2024 0
  • First RFK Jr., now Tulsi Gabbard

    August 29, 2024 0
  • Extreme Hideousness

    August 24, 2024 0
  • Summer of Weird

    July 30, 2024 0
  • Doors’ Jim Morrison girlfriend Mary Werbelow dead at 79

    July 2, 2024 0
  • Why Your Vote is Meaningless

    July 1, 2024 0
  • The Biden

    June 14, 2024 0
  • The Hyena & The Lizard (The Fight for Domineering Freedom)

    June 11, 2024 0
  • The Pets: On the Furniture

    June 8, 2024 0
  • Drug Run: Chapter 15 – Love Light

    June 5, 2024 0
  • Beyonce’s COWBOY CARTER: Racism vs Authenticity

    May 25, 2024 0
  • Award-winning literature from GT contributing editor Karene Horst and Flying Trees Publishing

    April 2, 2024 0
  • Gonzo Today: Still Standing Tall

    February 29, 2024 0

Hunter S. Thompson 1937-2005

Art
  • ART | How to paint like Ralph STEADman

    September 19, 2017 0
  • The Great Red Shark by Joey Feldman

    July 7, 2017 0
  • “People’s Fears” by Joey Feldman

    November 15, 2016 0

SUBSCRIBE TO GONZOTODAY.COM

Shorts
  • My Encounter with Hunter

    December 21, 2017 0
  • Drug Run | Chapters 1-10

    November 15, 2017 0
  • God’s Grace: An Abortion Story

    September 2, 2015 0
Music
  • Celebrating a Half Century of the Music of Frank Zappa

    June 5, 2017 0
  • Album Review: The Damn Truth’s Devilish Folk

    April 10, 2017 0
  • The Doors First Album and Mary Werbelow: 50 Years on

    December 30, 2016 0
The GonzoToday Interview
  • An Interview with Heathcote Williams

    July 7, 2017 0
  • A Quick Talk with Benicio Del Toro

    April 22, 2016 0
  • CIA Whistleblower John C. Kiriakou: the Gonzo Today Interview

    April 2, 2015 0

Copyright © 2025 | WordPress Theme by MH Themes