Hunter S. Thompson Quotes

“Playboy: Why are you smiling? Thompson: Am I smiling? Yeah, I guess I am…well, it’s fun to lose it sometimes.”
― Alex Haley, Hunter S. Thompson: The Playboy Interview (Singles Classic)

“Playboy: Do you ever wonder how you have survived this long? Thompson: Yes. Nobody expected me to get much past 20. Least of all me. I just assume, “Well, I got through today, but tomorrow might be different.” This is a very weird and twisted world; you can’t afford to get careless; don’t fuck around. You want to keep your affairs in order at all times.”
― Alex Haley, Hunter S. Thompson: The Playboy Interview (Singles Classic)

“I got a little tape recorder and laid it on my chest and kept describing the scene as I saw it. Just the opening scenes took about 45 minutes. I don’t know how it’s going to end, but I like it that way. If I knew how it ended, I’d lose interest in the story.”
― Alex Haley, Hunter S. Thompson: The Playboy Interview (Singles Classic)

“Crazies always recognize each other. I think Melville said it, in a slightly different context: “Genius all over the world stands hand in hand, and one shock of recognition runs the whole circle round.” Of course, we’re not talking about genius here, we’re talking about crazies—but”
― Alex Haley, Hunter S. Thompson: The Playboy Interview (Singles Classic)

“you shut the door, paint the windows black, rent an electric typewriter and become the monster you always were—the writer. I’d warned them about that.”
― Playboy, Hunter S. Thompson: The Playboy Interview (Singles Classic)

“In Washington, the truth is never told in daylight hours or across a desk. If you catch people when they’re very tired or drunk or weak, you can usually get some answers. So I’d sleep days, wait till these people got their lies and treachery out of the way, let them relax,”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Hunter S. Thompson: The Playboy Interview (Singles Classic)

“Playboy: Do you believe religious things about drugs? Thompson: No, I never have. That’s my main argument with the drug culture. I’ve never believed in that guru trip; you know, God, nirvana, that kind of oppressive, hipper-than-thou bullshit. I like to just gobble the stuff right out in the street and see what happens, take my chances, just stomp on my own accelerator. It’s like getting on a racing bike and all of a sudden you’re doing 120 miles per hour into a curve that has sand all over it and you think, “Holy Jesus, here we go,” and you lay it over till the pegs hit the street and metal starts to spark. If you’re good enough, you can pull it out, but sometimes you end up in the emergency room with some bastard in a white suit sewing your scalp back on.”
― Playboy, Hunter S. Thompson: The Playboy Interview (Singles Classic)