Thompson, Hunter S.; Illustrations by Ralph Steadman.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream.

New York: Random House, 1971. First edition of the author's second book. Octavo, original half cloth. Signed in full by Hunter S. Thompson and the illustrator, Ralph Steadman. Fine in a near fine price-clipped dust jacket that shows only light wear. Housed in a custom quarter morocco clamshell box. A very sharp copy.

The novel Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is based on two trips to Las Vegas, Nevada, that Hunter S. Thompson took with attorney and Chicano activist Oscar Zeta Acosta in March and April 1971. Thompson wrote that he concluded their March trip by spending some 36 hours alone in a hotel room "feverishly writing in my notebook" about his experiences. The genesis of Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A Savage Journey to the Heart of the American Dream is in that notebook. The book “cemented Mr. Thompson’s place as a singular presence in American journalism or, as he once called himself, ‘a connoisseur of edge work’” (New York Times). Adapted into the 1998 film starring Johnny Depp and Benicio Del Torro.

Item #884