A Vision for Gonzo

I had an epiphany the other day.  Whilst I was blessed with tongue wrapped presents of pissed off, disgusted, and in some cases…erratically over embellished, emotionally exacerbating, egocentric-cry-baby’s. (Waaaaaaaa).  The confusion of the art form raises eyebrows form South Korea  (Hey guys, LOVE SEOUL and Lotto world!!) to Russia (drink up) to Costa Rica (thanks Dad) to other more unpronounceable 12^th world countries (good luck with your 4^th revolution…this month).  All of these readers worldwide are beckoned by the truth they seek, because it’s just to fucking weird. 

                Story telling is an ancient art.  At one point crude, distasteful, and bleak words were used, like “uuunga—nngg” and “oohohohhoh”, to describe the events of the past, or to foretell the future.  As civilizations evolved, so did the art form.  Dramas, the novel, poetry, short stories, are all under the literary umbrella.  Previous to the invention of the Gutenberg press, all transcriptions were done by hand, a very long and painful process.  With the invention of the printing press, literature, and thus news, was able to quickly spread. 

                The role of NEWS (stands for north, east, west, south…I know, really?)  in the U.S. was initially debated.  During the 1920’s, journalism was divided into two schools of thought.  One school stated that journalist’s were to act as middlemen between the public and the policy makers of the time.  I speculate if this had anything to do with the average literacy and education rate of the time.  Basically, it was argued that the general public possessed sample sized brains, and was too dumb to interpret or formulate their own opinions (not to dissimilar to the current era).  As a result of this, the common man was rarely interviewed, on the grounds that he was essentially retarded.

The contrasting school of thought was that the role of journalists was to indeed interview the common man.  Community journalism was the new paradigm.  The concept of collective knowledge caught on, and indeed is far superior to that of the notion, that knowledge streaming from a soul “expert” individual is to be trusted.  Come lets face it, we all have “brain farts” and forget things, and even more to the point, who better to ask then the common man about current trends and opinions, as it would in theory reflect the general consensus. 

Gonzo Journalism is a form of journalism that is subjective in nature, and often places the author and his feelings as part of the narrative.  Gonzo journalism tends to utilize personal experiences, feelings, and emotions to illustrate an accurate representation of the given subject. This phenomenon (as opposed to traditional journalism which is objective in nature) makes the story more personal as it is a less detached writing style and relies on facts or observations verified by third parties, or even pure speculation.  Gonzo journalism has no boundaries, and disregards the edited product, favoring a raw, organic, personal approach-the personality of a piece (rather the author) is just as important as the event the piece is on.  Irony, sarcasm, profanity and comedy are favored in this art to illustrate points in a different light that previously could not be presented in such a way and thus capture life on life's terms, a very accurate portrayal of the truth.

So what is the truth?  Your truth is likely different from my truth, but it is the truth none the less.  My goal for this project is to capture the emotional essence of society and culture.  We as people can read information, but often times, that information is categorized without any feeling.  If you were to read “This man died”, you would most likely feel that a tragedy occurred.  If you were to read “John Bowers took his final breath in pain, as I watched his eyes roll back into his head, and his lungs filled up with fluid.  He started to drown in his own fluids, and died a long and painful death.”  You would more likely feel sad.  So what exists on this earth?

Well, from my experience, it’s essentially a giant fucking rat race, and it thoroughly disgusts me.  I have found that you collect more flies with honey then you do with vinegar.  Positive re-enforcement is better than negative re-enforcement.  The truth can better be told if the emotional essence is kept in the story, thus bringing a human quality to it.  The format of “Gonzo” can also be applied to stories, the novel, poetry, and so on.  My attempt here is to apply it in all forms of literature, thus creating an anti-literature, and a true work of art.

So now that we understand the purpose and goal here, a look to the future…In addition to all these “Gonzo” tales, I will include in my portfolio, traditional forms of writing as well.   Essays, poetry, etc.  However, in the interest of “Gonzo” I ask that you my reader, make ongoing comments for me to feed from…essentially, I would LOVE to incorporate your thoughts and feelings into my work, almost like theater sports (if you don’t know what that is, look it up).  Well, any thoughts on this????  I’m going to go play my bass now.   Until next time world…