Books

First edition in book form, first printing, of the author's semi-fictional account of his trip to Las Vegas, accompanied by his lawyer and a collection of drugs resembling "a mobile police narcotics lab" (p. 4). The novel was adapted into a film by Terry Gilliam in 1998, starring Johnny Depp and Benicio del Toro. The novel's blend of fact and fiction initiated the genre of "gonzo journalism", which rejected objectivity and placed the writer or reporter at the centre of the story. It first appeared as a two-part series in Rolling Stone magazine in November 1971. Publication in book form followed in June 1972, in dust jackets dated 6/72 on the rear flap, as here. Octavo. Original black quarter cloth, spine lettered in silver, grey board sides, illustration on front cover after Steadman in blind. With dust jacket. Illustrated title page and 19 line drawings by Ralph Steadman. Fading to board edges, gentle residue on rear free endpaper; jacket unclipped, lightly creased and toned, colours bright: a very good copy in like jacket.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the best chronicle of drug-soaked, addle-brained, rollicking good times ever committed to the printed page. It is also the tale of a long weekend road trip that has gone down in the annals of American pop culture as one of the strangest journeys ever undertaken.