The Great Shark Hunt is a book by Hunter S. Thompson

Hunter S. Thompson

Hunter Stockton Thompson was an American journalist and author who wrote The Rum Diary , Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 .He is credited as the creator of Gonzo journalism, a style of reporting where reporters involve themselves in the action to...

. Originally published in 1979 as Gonzo Papers, Vol. 1: The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time, the book is a roughly 600-page collection of Thompson's essays from 1956 to the end of the 1970s, following the rise of the author's own gonzo journalism

Gonzo journalism

Gonzo journalism is a style of journalism that is written without claims of objectivity, often including the reporter as part of the story via a first-person narrative. The word "gonzo" is believed to be first used in 1970 to describe an article by Hunter S. Thompson, who later popularized the style...

 style as he moved from Air Force

United States Air Force

The United States Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the American uniformed services. Initially part of the United States Army, the USAF was formed as a separate branch of the military on September 18, 1947 under the National Security Act of...

 and sports beat-writing to straight-ahead political commentary. It is the first of four volumes in The Gonzo Papers

The Gonzo Papers

The Gonzo Papers is a four volume series of books by American journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson published between 1979 and 1994. The word Gonzo is often used to describe the unique style of journalism that Thompson cultivated throughout his life....

series.

Contents

The book is broken into four parts, moving from Thompson's earliest writing for the U.S. Air Force, through his sports articles, then into his middle years of political and cultural commentary and beyond. Some excerpts from the author's two original Fear and Loathing serials (...in Las Vegas and ...on the Campaign Trail '72

Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72

Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72 is a collection of articles covering the 1972 presidential campaign written by the gonzo journalist Hunter S Thompson and illustrated by Ralph Steadman...

) are also included. Thompson worked for several different publications throughout his career, and The Great Shark Hunt covers articles from the National Observer, Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone

Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...

, Scanlan's Monthly

Scanlan's Monthly

Scanlan's Monthly was a short-lived monthly publication, which ran from March 1970 to January 1971. Edited by Warren Hinckle III and Sidney Zion, it featured politically controversial muckraking and was ultimately subject to an investigation by the FBI during the Nixon administration. It was...

, The New York Times

The New York Times

The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...

, Playboy

Playboy

Playboy is an American men's magazine that features photographs of nude women as well as journalism and fiction. It was founded in Chicago in 1953 by Hugh Hefner and his associates, and funded in part by a $1,000 loan from Hefner's mother. The magazine has grown into Playboy Enterprises, Inc., with...

, and others.

Notable persons depicted by the author as cavorting about with him include his illustrator and friend Ralph Steadman

Ralph Steadman

Ralph Steadman is a British cartoonist and caricaturist who is perhaps best known for his work with American author Hunter S. Thompson.-Personal life:Steadman was born in Wallasey, Cheshire, and brought up in Towyn, North Wales...

, Chicano

Chicano

The terms "Chicano" and "Chicana" are used in reference to U.S. citizens of Mexican descent. However, those terms have a wide range of meanings in various parts of the world. The term began to be widely used during the Chicano Movement, mainly among Mexican Americans, especially in the movement's...

 lawyer Oscar Zeta Acosta

Oscar Zeta Acosta

Oscar Zeta Acosta was an American attorney, politician, minor novelist and Chicano Movement activist, perhaps best known for his friendship with the American author Hunter S. Thompson, who characterized him as his Samoan Attorney, Dr...

, Olympic

Olympic Games

The Olympic Games is a major international event featuring summer and winter sports, in which thousands of athletes participate in a variety of competitions. The Olympic Games have come to be regarded as the world’s foremost sports competition where more than 200 nations participate...

 skier Jean-Claude Killy

Jean-Claude Killy

Jean-Claude Killy was an alpine ski racer, who dominated the sport in the late 1960s. He was a triple Olympic champion, winning the three alpine events at the 1968 Winter Olympics, becoming the most successful athlete there...

, and then-football

American football

American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...

 player O. J. Simpson

O. J. Simpson

Orenthal James "O. J." Simpson , nicknamed "The Juice", is a retired American collegiate and professional football player, football broadcaster, and actor...

. Political figures appearing prominently in the collection include former U.S. presidents Richard Nixon

Richard Nixon

Richard Milhous Nixon was the 37th President of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. The only president to resign the office, Nixon had previously served as a US representative and senator from California and as the 36th Vice President of the United States from 1953 to 1961 under...

 and Jimmy Carter

Jimmy Carter

James Earl "Jimmy" Carter, Jr. is an American politician who served as the 39th President of the United States and was the recipient of the 2002 Nobel Peace Prize, the only U.S. President to have received the Prize after leaving office...

, and Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern

George McGovern

George Stanley McGovern is an historian, author, and former U.S. Representative, U.S. Senator, and the Democratic Party nominee in the 1972 presidential election....

.

Missing, however, are the illustrations by Ralph Steadman that originally accompanied many of the Thompson articles in this collection.

Table of contents

From the 1992 Simon & Schuster

Simon & Schuster

Simon & Schuster, Inc., a division of CBS Corporation, is a publisher founded in New York City in 1924 by Richard L. Simon and M. Lincoln Schuster. It is one of the four largest English-language publishers, alongside Random House, Penguin and HarperCollins...

 paperback edition, with one entry by Art Linkletter

Art Linkletter

Arthur Gordon "Art" Linkletter was a Canadian-born American radio and television personality. He was the host of House Party, which ran on CBS radio and television for 25 years, and People Are Funny, on NBC radio-TV for 19 years...

 and bibliographies by Kihm Winship.

Part One

Author's Note /
Fear and Loathing in the Bunker /
The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved

The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved

"The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved" is a seminal sports article by Hunter S. Thompson on the 1970 Kentucky Derby in Louisville, Kentucky, first appearing in an issue of Scanlan's Monthly in June of that year...

/
A Southern City with Northern Problems /
Fear and Loathing at the Super Bowl /
The Temptations of Jean-Claude Killy

The Temptations of Jean-Claude Killy

"The Temptations of Jean-Claude Killy" is an article published in the premiere issue of Scanlan's Monthly in March 1970, written by Hunter S. Thompson....

/
The Ultimate Free Lancer /
Collect Telegram from a Mad Dog /
"Genius 'Round the World Stand Hand in Hand, and One Shock of Recognition Runs the Whole Circle 'Round" by Art Linkletter (This quote was attributed to Linkletter by Thompson, but it is, in fact, a quote from Herman Melville) /
Jacket Copy for Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream /
A Conversation on Ralph Steadman and His Book, America, with Dr. Hunter S. Thompson /
Strange Rumblings in Aztlan

Strange Rumblings in Aztlan

"Strange Rumblings in Aztlan" is an article published in Rolling Stone #81, dated April 29, 1971, and written by Hunter S. Thompson.The article takes its title from the name Aztlán, referring to the "conquered territories" of Mexico that came under United States control after the Mexican-American War...

/
Freak Power in the Rockies

The Battle of Aspen

"The Battle of Aspen" was an article published in Rolling Stone #67, dated October 1, 1970 and written by Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. The cover of the magazine ran the teaser "Freak Power in the Rockies", and the article was later reprinted in The Great Shark Hunt with that same title.The article's...

/
Memo from the Sports Desk: The So-Called "Jesus Freak" Scare /
Memoirs of a Wretched Weekend in Washington

Part Two

Presenting: The Richard Nixon Doll (Overhauled 1968 Model) /
Author's Note /
June, 1972: The McGovern Juggernaut Rolls On /
Later in June /
September /
October /
Epitaph /
Memo from the Sports Desk & Rude Notes from a Decompression Chamber in Miami /
Fear and Loathing at the Watergate: Mr. Nixon Has Cashed His Check /
Fear and Loathing in Washington: The Boys in the Bag /
Fear and Loathing in Limbo: The Scum Also Rises

Part Three

Traveler Hears Mountain Music Where It's Sung /
A Footloose American in a Smugglers' Den /
Why Anti-Gringo Winds Often Blow South of the Border /
Democracy Dies in Peru, but Few Seem to Mourn Its Passing /
The Inca of the Andes: He Haunts the Ruins of His Once-Great Empire /
Brazilshooting /
Chatty Letters During a Journey from Aruba to Rio /
What Lured Hemingway to Ketchum /
Living in the Time of Alger, Greeley, Debs /
Marlon Brando and the Indian Fish-In /
The "Hashbury" Is the Capital of the Hippies /
When the Beatniks Were Social Lions /
The Nonstudent Left /
Those Daring Young Men in Their Flying Machines . . . Ain't What They Used to Be! /
The Police Chief

Part Four

The Great Shark Hunt /
Jimmy Carter and the Great Leap of Faith /
Address by Jimmy Carter on Law Day: University of Georgia, Athens, GA /
The Banshee Screams for Buffalo Meat /
The Hoodlum Circus and the Statutory Rape of Bass Lake /
Ashes to Ashes & Dust to Dust: The Funeral of Mother Miles /
Welcome to Las Begas: When the Going Gets Weird the Weird Turn Pro /
Last Tango in Vegas: Fear and Loathing in the Near Room /
Last Tango in Vegas: Fear and Loathing in the Far Room /
Bibliography of Work by Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, by Kihm Winship /
Bibliography of Work on Dr. Hunter S. Thompson, by Kihm Winship

Citation

Thompson, Hunter S. Gonzo Papers, Vol. 1: The Great Shark Hunt: Strange Tales from a Strange Time. New York: Summit Books, 1979; Simon & Schuster, 2003 (ISBN 0-7432-5045-1)