Re: RARA-AVIS: Hunter S. Thompson [long]

From: Doug Bassett ( dj_bassett@yahoo.com)
Date: 12 Apr 2000


I'm thinking of "realism" here in traditional literary terms: something like "a truthful portrayal of the environment and society." You could say "exterior reality" or "outer-directedness" as opposed to
"interior reality" or "inner-directedness", I guess.

This is no knock against FEAR AND LOATHING, a book I really like. Not everything that's good has to be hb, after all.

--- Bob Toomey < btoomey@javanet.com> wrote:
> > -- A realistic presentation of the world. It can
> be a
> > sf or fantasy world, but it's got to be
> realistically
> > presented. (This opts out FEAR AND LOATHING and
> any
> > other book that deals with altered states of
> > consciousness).
>
> Sorry for ellipsing you...but as someone who has
> been through a number
> of the altered states that Thompson describes I can
> say that it's as
> realistic and dead accurate as John McPhee's
> description of tectonic
> plates in ASSEMBLING CALIFORNIA.

Ah, I'd ask about your "number of altered states", but it's probably better that I live in mystery, huh? :)
 
 -- For lack of a better phrase, a
> "Hemingway-esque"
> > style or derived style. I can't see any way you
> fit
> > Proust into the tradition, for instance.
>
> Or Jane Austen, L. Frank Baum, or P.G. Wodehouse.
> Extreme misses are
> easy, close calls are the problem.

Agreed. This is a rough definition, too, so I'm willing to look at near misses and close calls

doug

===== Doug Bassett dj_bassett@yahoo.com

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