An honest and bold account of America's cult the Hell's Angels

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	• Hell's Angels: A Strange and Terrible Saga (Modern Library) Hunter S. Thompson Modern Library, 1999 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 113 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

An honest and bold account of America's cult the Hell's Angels

Americans are as fascinated with violence as the outlaw motorcycle cult, the Hell's Angels, are encouraged to provide it. Hunter S. Thompson's "year of close association" made "Hell's Angels." Graphically it explains the colorful characters, group practices, accompanied by the steady consumption of drugs, alcohol, and violent sex. Thompson offers an account that breaks the myths into truths and untruths.

In a calm tone that neither reaches fascination nor condemnation, Thompson gives a close look at the Angels through what we least expect: lame parties and men who want to be heroes, to what we do expect: gang rape, gang violence, and a lot of people whose ultimate goal is to collect unemployment.

A moderate perspective of mainly white Anglo-Saxons under thirty, reeking of bike grease and human waste crushed into their initiation clothing, whose most frequent hangouts are taverns, emergency rooms, and jails. The outlaws' only source of pride lies in an individually customized Harley and by the colors of belonging to the Hell's Angels.

"The outlaws tend to see their bikes as personal monuments, created in their own image, however abstract, and they develop an affection for them that is hard for outsiders to understand."1

Thompson criticizes journalists and the police for not understanding the Angels, but acting as if they do. A certain finesse is required for dealing with the Angels. Angels. Angels do not care about the law, in fact, they will easily flaunt any behavior they think will shock onlookers. For no other reason two Angels will often embrace and kiss one another for the benefit of company. Thompson also summarizes the public view of the Hell's Angels.

"They command a fascination, however reluctant, that borders on psychic masturbation."2

Thompson's honest and original research uncovers America's fraternal motorcycle cult at the peak of their fame. As individuals, the members have no future, as a whole, that is a separate question. It seems that as long as men are unable to fit in modern society there is always a club or cult, depending on taste, waiting in the shadows.

1 pg. 92.

2 pg. 262.

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Huntter the king

great book.It changed my view about Hells Angels.I didn't know much about them nor did I had any interst in geting to know them.But after I read it I was glad I did.I have more respect about for them they had some fun time back then and Hunter tells u all about it.

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Saddle Up!

Oh yeah! One of my favorite books, and one of the very few that I have read more than once. A great luxury of reading . . . live a little of the wild life from the comfort of your Barkolounger. In more of a documentary style than the usual fare from the gonzomaniac. A very nice piece of investigative reporting AND adventure writing. Made such an impression on me 20 years ago that I took my Sportster up Highway 1 out of Santa Cruz late one Friday night, just to "re-live" the last page of the book (I won't ruin it for you . . . buy your own copy).

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Highly readable snapshot of a '60s cultural phenonmenon

This was the book that first brought Hunter S. Thompson to national attention, and deservedly so. He dissects the cultural phenomenon that was the Hell's Angels in the mid-1960s with great insight and a prose style that reads like a cold beer on a hot day -- impossible to put down.

Thompson stressed two major themes in his assessment on the Angels: (1) They were largely a bunch of "losers," men with very limited opportunities to achieve The American Dream, who banded together to create The American Nightmare of violent anarchy, or at least the image of violent anarchy. In Thompson's portrayal, the Angels seem to revel in their "outsider" status and in their calculated efforts to shake up the "squares." Thompson also indicates that the image of Hell's Angels in the '60s seems to have mattered far more than the relatively isolated incidents of violence and public outrage they perpetrated. (2) That image was swallowed whole by the mainstream media of the mid-'60s (and by law enforcement officials), so that square Americans already reeling from the civil rights movement and black unrest, from the sexual revolution of the '60s, and from the "counterculture" and antiwar movements, were presented with one more reason to believe that the country was going to hell. Thomson sees the hysteria over the Angels in that era as essentially a creation of gullible reporters and paranoid politicians and cops.

This book (which came out in 1966) catches the California-based Angels between 1964 and 1966, as the hysteria was spreading. Eventually the Angels began to believe the media image too, which led to that fatal night at Altamont Raceway in 1969. Thompson may bear some of that responsibility, too, simply because his book was The Word on the Angels in that time; but his accurate assessment of the Angels was overwhelmed by the popular image that "outlaw bikers," Hollywood, and the media as a whole found profitable to promote.

Some reviewers portray "Hell's Angels" as the story of Thompson's own involvement with the motorcycle group. Certainly, Thompson is a "character" in the book, but he's careful to keep some distance from the Angels. (In the first-person centerpiece of the book, an Angels "run" to Bass Lake, California in 1965, Thompson traveled by automobile rather than on a "chopper.") Moreover, he never forgets that the story he's trying to tell is of the motorcycle club and their image, not about himself. His detached involvement (involved detachment?) in this book is a model for all insistently subjective journalists. I have read little of Thompson's later work, and I gather that as he became more concerned about hyping his own image, he worked up some calculated outrages of his own; but "Hell's Angels" remains a damned good piece of "new" reporting.

Since the 1960s, Hell's Angels -- portrayed by some romantic pukes in Thompson's time as latter-day cowboys, the last champions of traditional American "freedom" -- has gone corporate, handing out franchises ("charters") around the world and selling logoed merchandise. The most famous of the Angels, Ralph "Sonny" Barger, has parlayed his status as Oakland chapter president into a franchise of his own (complete with website), marketing his own "lean and mean" brand of beer, writing a philosophical self-help book and selling signed copies at motorcycle shows. Certain outlaw motorcyclists still are being blamed (with some justification, apparently) for a variety of crimes in various countries. Thompson's book has little to do with the commercialized Hell's Angels or felonious "1 percenters" of today. It's a book very much of its time and place -- but such a well-focused, incisive snapshot it is!

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The Growl of Old Uncle Harvey

How the great Hunter Thompson survived the numerous tribal romps detailed in this novel is an astounding attestment to the author's adaptability despite his masculine and gonzo-eyed presence. While there is sure to be a hint of exagerration due to Thompson's Dali-like warped view of the content in front of his eyes, what he captures is sure entertaining and really transports the reader to that moment in time.

While not as saucy and subserviently humorous as some of his better tales, this two year existence on the road with one of the most dangerous sub-cultures to existent in 20th century Western Culture, is a delightful study. The character's images, personality, excursions, and lifestyle are greatly conveyed through the colorful descriptions of Thompson. In addition, the confusing disorganization and initial fragementation of each Angels group is described, with future recklessness and dissolution portended (i.e. Altamount). Cheers Hunter

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reviews: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, page 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15

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