Running on empty, and on and on

Hunter Stockton Thompson blazed across the republic of American arts and letters for too short a time. When in February 2005 Thompson, 67, killed himself with a .45 at home in Woody Creek, Colorado, freethinkers and lovers of his savage, beautiful words grieved the world over — and we still do.

Thompson was a Southern boy from Louisville, Kentucky, whence comes F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Daisy Fay, later Buchanan. After a sally into higher education and military service, both marked by varying degrees of brilliance and insubordination, Thompson moved to New York City and worked as a reporter. His specialty was, initially, sport, and his forte was observation. He was 21 and working for TIME magazine on its copy desk when he decided to type out The Great Gatsby just to see how it felt, how Fitzgerald’s style affected his fingertips.

He travelled alone for a story, by car or boat or canoe or motorcycle, and took his own (excellent) photographs.