The Proud Highway Quotes

“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming "Wow! What a Ride!”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“We are all alone, born alone, die alone, and—in spite of True Romance magazines—we shall all someday look back on our lives and see that, in spite of our company, we were alone the whole way. I do not say lonely—at least, not all the time—but essentially, and finally, alone. This is what makes your self-respect so important, and I don't see how you can respect yourself if you must look in the hearts and minds of others for your happiness.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“A man who procrastinates in his choosing will inevitably have his choice made for him by circumstance.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Let us toast to animal pleasures, to escapism, to rain on the roof and instant coffee, to unemployment insurance and library cards, to absinthe and good-hearted landlords, to music and warm bodies and contraceptives... and to the "good life", whatever it is and wherever it happens to be.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman

“I have no taste for either poverty or honest labor, so writing is the only recourse left for me.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Life is not a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming, “Wow what a ride!”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“To make a point of declaring friendship is to cheapen it. For men's emotions are very rarely put into words successfully. ”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“In San Francisco - life goes on. Hope rises and dreams flicker and die. Love plans for tomorrow and loneliness thinks of yesterday. Life is beautiful and living is pain. The sound of music floats down a dark street. A young girl looks out a window and wishes she were married. A drunk sleeps under a bridge. It is tomorrow.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“It is from the bystanders (who are in the vast majority) that we receive the propaganda that life is not worth living, that life is drudgery, that the ambitions of youth must he laid aside for a life which is but a painful wait for death. These are the ones who squeeze what excitement they can from life out of the imaginations and experiences of others through books and movies. These are the insignificant and forgotten men who preach conformity because it is all they know. These are the men who dream at night of what could have been, but who wake at dawn to take their places at the now-familiar rut and to merely exist through another day. For them, the romance of life is long dead and they are forced to go through the years on a treadmill, cursing their existence, yet afraid to die because of the unknown which faces them after death. They lacked the only true courage: the kind which enables men to face the unknown regardless of the consequences.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Every reaction is a learning process; every significant experience alters your perspective. So it would seem foolish, would it not, to adjust our lives to the demands of a goal we see from a different angle everyday? How could we ever hope to accomplish anything anther than galloping neurosis?”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“I drink much less than most people think, and I think much more than most people would believe.”
― Hunter S Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“The mind of America is seized by a fatal dry rot - and it's only a question of time before all that the mind controls will run amuck in a frenzy of stupid impotent fear. (In a letter dated 9-26-58)”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Life just seems too huge and too fascinating for me to begin thinking about curing my restlessness at this stage of the game. Maybe later.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“As for LSD, I highly recommend it. We had a fine, wild weekend and no trouble at all. The feeling it produces is hard to describe. 'Intensity' is a fair word for it. Try half a cube at first, just sit in the living room and turn on the music - after the kids have gone to bed. But never take it in uncomfortable or socially tense situations. And don't have anybody around whom you don't like.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“I have tonight begun reading a stupid, shitty book by Kerouac called Big Sur, and I would give a ball to wake up tomorrow on some empty ridge with a herd of beatniks grazing in the clearing about 200 yards below the house. And then to squat with the big boomer and feel it on my shoulder with the smell of grease and powder and, later, a little blood.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Love plans for tomorrow and loneliness thinks of yesterday.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“a nervous society where a man’s image is frequently more important than his reality,”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“I've never given much thought to grants but now that LeRoi Jones has a Guggenheim I have to consider the possibility of a new era, for good or ill. So if you're sitting down there on a bundle of loose cash I'd appreciate any and all advice as to how I might lay my hands on some of it.

- in a letter to Richard Scowcroft dated 5/13/1965”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“About a week earlier I had finished a book (on the Hell's Angels, scheduled this fall by Random House) and I felt that I needed about a week of total degeneration to cool out my system. To this end I went down to Big Sur and Monterery and filled my body with every variety of booze and drug available to modern man. For six or seven days I ran happily amok - spending money, sitting in baths, and futilely hunting wild boar with a .44 Magnum revolver. At one point I gave my car away to a man who paid $25 for the privilege of pushing it off a 400-foot cliff.

- to Max Scherr editor, Berkley Barb 7/20/1966”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“And only those who can see above and beyond the American goal of respectable mediocrity can enjoy a life that leads to anything but a struggle to attain that end.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“For the sake of everything you presently take for granted, give up all ideas of volunteering for the draft: or for anything military. It is a way of life which was never meant for our type. Being almost wholly composed of dullards and intellectual sluggards, it is a painful hell for anyone with an I.Q. over 80. Be a beachcomber, a Parisian wino, an Italian pimp, or a Danish pervert; but stay away from the Armed Forces. It is a catch-all for people who regard every tomorrow as a hammer swinging at the head of man, and whose outstanding trait is a fearful mistrust of everything out of the ordinary. Should you volunteer, it will be two years lost in a sea of ignorance.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“OK for now. I enjoyed my quick, high-powered visit over there and look forward to a dead-game replay when I'm in better condition. Tell Hinckle he'd better take some liver exercises...and also to get braced for my wild cards, which don't always mix well with grapefruit juice and burbon.

- To Peter Collier 10/11/1967”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“stupid lie, regardless of who writes it or tries to justify it, is still a stupid lie … even when it’s wrapped up in flowers.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“The dawn is killing me off, the fog is on the windows, the [ra]coons have robbed the cans, and down in Rio its 8 a.m. and the whores who missed last night are already out on the beach in their fine little bikinis and if I could get my hands on just one of them I would be God's happiest man. But that's not likely tonight, so I'll get some sleep and wake up tomorrow with a fix on the Hell's Angels.

- to Angus Cameron in a letter dated 06/28/1965”
― Hunter S. Thompson, The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“About a week earlier I had finished a book (on the Hell’s Angels, scheduled this fall by Random House) and I felt that I needed about a week of total degeneration to cool out my system. To this end I went clown to Big Sur and Monterey and filled my body with every variety of booze and drug available to modern man. For six or seven days I ran happily amok—spending money, sitting in baths, and futilely hunting wild boar with a .44 Magnum revolver. At one point I gave my car away to a man who paid $25 for the privilege of pushing it off a 400-foot cliff.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Admittedly, the ride can be pleasant if you don’t mind the rhythmic repetition of a never-ending Maypole dance. If I came home now, I’d hit the merry-go-round at one of the annual, frenzied peaks. And, like so many others, I could forget the existence of anything but the ride: sleep-walking through the low spots, and always looking toward the next peak.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“Unless I weaken—and I might—I think I’ll be sure I can fly before I return to the nest. It should be interesting … if nothing else.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967

“If I don’t have a job by then—and the kind of job I want is scarce as hell—then I’ll be off again. Where I’m going to get the money to go bouncing around the country like this is a real interesting problem: but I shall find it somewhere. I’ll have to.”
― Hunter S. Thompson, Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman, 1955-1967