Somehow, amid the celebration of Tom Wolfe's new novel, A Man in Full, there seems to have been a slight misunderstanding. The much-publicized intellectual conflicts of the past decade may have lost their intensity, but they haven't lost their importance. A book like Marjorie Garber's latest reminds us why. Sven Birkerts looks at Hunter S. Thompson's The Proud Highway and wonders whatever happened to sex, drugs, and the New Journalism. Plus, a multimedia interview with Hunter S. Thompson, scourge of presidents, the press, and the politically correct.
Pavement is only possible if one mistakes irony for cynicism and self-awareness for camp.
This is nothing new. But it's only if you think that transforming the world is possible that mowing the lawn can seem contemptible. All rights reserved.