Hunter S. Thompson nejznámější citáty
Originál: [(en) The music business is a cruel and shallow money trench, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free, and good men die like dogs.]
Zdroj: [Hunter S Thompson: in his own words, http://www.theguardian.com/books/2005/feb/21/huntersthompson, 2005-02-25, 2015-02-28, The Guardian, London, anglicky]
Zdroj: [Mitchell, Tim, Sedition and Alchemy: A Biography of John Cale, Peter Owen, London, 2003, 239, Dave McKean, 0 7206 11326, 15, anglicky]
Hunter S. Thompson citáty a výroky
[(en) The TV business is uglier than most things. It is normally perceived as some kind of cruel and shallow money trench through the heart of the journalism industry, a long plastic hallway where thieves and pimps run free and good men die like dogs, for no good reason.
Which is more or less true. For the most part, they are dirty little animals with huge brains and no pulse.]
— [(en) Generation of Swine], část [(en) Full Time Scrambling] (4. listopadu 1985)Thompsonovi bývá mylně přisuzován upravený výrok, například ve znění:
Zdroj: [Thompson, Hunter s., Generation of Swine: Tales of Shame and Degradation in the '80's, Simon & Schuster, New York, 1988, 1, 313, 43, 0-7432-5044-3, anglicky]
Zdroj: [Resnikoff, Paul, What Hunter S. Thompson Really Said About the Music Industry…, Digital Music News, 2013-04-24, 2020-06-22, 2019-08-24, https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2013/04/24/thompson/, https://web.archive.org/web/20190824051933/https://www.digitalmusicnews.com/2013/04/24/thompson/, anglicky]
Hunter S. Thompson: Citáty anglicky
“Richard Nixon has never been one of my favorite people anyway.”
Pageant (July 1968)
1960s
Kontext: Richard Nixon has never been one of my favorite people anyway. For years I've regarded his existence as a monument to all the rancid genes and broken chromosomes that corrupt the possibilities of the American Dream; he was a foul caricature of himself, a man with no soul, no inner convictions, with the integrity of a hyena and the style of a poison toad. The Nixon I remembered was absolutely humorless; I couldn't imagine him laughing at anything except maybe a paraplegic who wanted to vote Democratic but couldn't quite reach the lever on the voting machine.
1990s, The Rum Diary (1998)
Kontext: Suddenly I was tired of Lotterman; he was a phony and he didn't even know it. He was forever yapping about freedom of the press and keeping the paper going, but if he'd had a million dollars and all the freedom in the world he'd still put out a worthless newspaper because he wasn't smart enough to put out a good one. He was just another noisy little punk in the great legion of punks who marched between the banners of bigger and better men. Freedom, Truth, Honour — you could rattle off a hundred such words and behind every one of them would gather a thousand punks, pompous little farts, waving the banner with one hand and reaching under the table with the other.
I stood up. "Ed," I said using his name for the first time, "I believe I'll quit."
1990s, The Rum Diary (1998)
Kontext: Most people who deal in words don't have much faith in them and I am no exception — especially the big ones like Happy and Love and Honest and Strong. They are too elusive and far too relative when you compare them to sharp, mean little words like Punk and Cheap and Phony. I feel at home with these, because they are scrawny and easy to pin, but the big ones are tough and it takes either a priest or a fool to use them with any confidence.
"The Hashbury is the Capital of the Hippies" (May 1967); republished in Gonzo Papers, Vol. 1: The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time (1979), <!-- NY: Simon & Schuster -->pp 392-394
1960s
Kontext: The hippies, who had never really believed they were the wave of the future anyway, saw the election results as brutal confirmation of the futility of fighting the establishment on its own terms. There had to be a whole new scene, they said, and the only way to do it was to make the big move — either figuratively or literally — from Berkeley to the Haight-Ashbury, from pragmatism to mysticism, from politics to dope... The thrust is no longer for "change" or "progress" or "revolution," but merely to escape, to live on the far perimeter of a world that might have been.
“The hard core, the outlaw elite, were the Hell's Angels…”
1960s, Hell's Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs (1966)
Kontext: The hard core, the outlaw elite, were the Hell's Angels... wearing the winged death's-head on the back of their sleeveless jackets and packing their "mamas" behind them on big "chopped hogs." They rode with a fine unwashed arrogance, secure in their reputation as the rottenest motorcycle gang in the whole history of Christendom.
"Fast and Furious" (14 October 2003)
2000s
Kontext: I take no pleasure in being Right in my dark predictions about the fate of our military intervention in the heart of the Muslim world. It is immensely depressing to me. Nobody likes to be betting against the Home team.
1970s, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 (1973)
Kontext: So much for Objective Journalism. Don't bother to look for it here — not under any byline of mine; or anyone else I can think of. With the possible exception of things like box scores, race results, and stock market tabulations, there is no such thing as Objective Journalism. The phrase itself is a pompous contradiction in terms.
"A Sad Week in America" (10 March 2003)
2000s
Kontext: What the hell is going on here? How could this once-proud nation have changed so much, so drastically, in only a little more than two years. In what seems like the blink of an eye, this George Bush has brought us from a prosperous nation at peace to a broke nation at war.
1960s, Hell's Angels: The Strange and Terrible Saga of the Outlaw Motorcycle Gangs (1966)
Kontext: A man who has blown all his options can't afford the luxury of changing his ways. He has to capitalize on whatever he has left, and he can't afford to admit — no matter how often he's reminded of it — that every day of his life takes him farther and farther down a blind alley... Very few toads in this world are Prince Charmings in disguise. Most are simply toads... and they are going to stay that way... Toads don't make laws or change any basic structures, but one or two rooty insights can work powerful changes in the way they get through life. A toad who believes he got a raw deal before he even knew who was dealing will usually be sympathetic to the mean, vindictive ignorance that colors the Hell's Angels' view of humanity. There is not much mental distance between a feeling of having been screwed and the ethic of total retaliation, or at least the random revenge that comes with outraging the public decency.
Zdroj: Hell's Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga
"September,", p. 413
1970s, Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 (1973)
Kontext: This may be the year when we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it — that we are really just a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable.
Kontext: If the current polls are reliable... Nixon will be re-elected by a huge majority of Americans who feel he is not only more honest and more trustworthy than George McGovern, but also more likely to end the war in Vietnam. The polls also indicate that Nixon will get a comfortable majority of the Youth Vote. And that he might carry all fifty states... This may be the year when we finally come face to face with ourselves; finally just lay back and say it — that we are really just a nation of 220 million used car salesmen with all the money we need to buy guns, and no qualms at all about killing anybody else in the world who tries to make us uncomfortable. The tragedy of all this is that George McGovern, for all his mistakes... understands what a fantastic monument to all the best instincts of the human race this country might have been, if we could have kept it out of the hands of greedy little hustlers like Richard Nixon. McGovern made some stupid mistakes, but in context they seem almost frivolous compared to the things Richard Nixon does every day of his life, on purpose... Jesus! Where will it end? How low do you have to stoop in this country to be President?
“Weird behavior is natural in smart children, like curiosity is to a kitten.”
Zdroj: Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-Crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century
“You better take care of me Lord, if you don't you're gonna have me on your hands.”
Zdroj: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
“It was one of those fine little love stories that can make you smile in your sleep at night.”
Zdroj: Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-Crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century
“Buy the ticket, take the ride.”
Zdroj: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas
Zdroj: Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72
Letter to Arch Gerhart (29 January 1958), p. 106
1990s, The Proud Highway : The Fear and Loathing Letters Volume I (1997)
Zdroj: The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967
Kontext: Events of the past two years have virtually decreed that I shall wrestle with the literary muse for the rest of my days. And so, having tasted the poverty of one end of the scale, I have no choice but to direct my energies toward the acquisition of fame and fortune. Frankly, I have no taste for either poverty or honest labor, so writing is the only recourse left me.

“Morality is temporary, wisdom is permanent.”
2000s, Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century (2004)
Zdroj: Kingdom of Fear: Loathsome Secrets of a Star-Crossed Child in the Final Days of the American Century
“No, this is not a good town for psychedelic drugs. Reality itself is too twisted.”
Zdroj: Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas