Erm…what have I just read? I am not the kind of reader who opens a book with set expectations. Even less so a non-fiction book about a subject I am unfamiliar with. But any book should have at least some structure that readers could follow. “Hell’s Angels” by Hunter S. Thompson had none.
I was curious to learn about the ‘behind-the-scenes’ of the motorcycle gang’s life. That’s what was advertised. The author did not simply conduct research on Hell’s Angels. He ‘lived their life’ with them for a year. Alas, either they did not let him in deeper than what’s on the surface, or he did not care about the ‘end product,’ having received advance payment and knowing that whatever he handed in to his publisher would be published.
This book has no substance. After reading it, I still know almost nothing about Hell’s Angels. I don’t have a clue about what this whole gang thing is all about. From what I was able to glean from the extremely chaotic narrative was that they look cool when riding their cool bikes. And that they call their bikes ‘hogs.’
A substantial part of the book is dedicated to one of the Hell’s Angels runs, an important event that gathers the gang together. The author painstakingly describes that run and the weekend that the Hell’s Angels spent in a small resort called Bass Lake. It was boring and anticlimactic, and as far as I understand, the aim of making this episode central to the book was to show that Hell’s Angels aren’t as bad as the media made them look. Nothing happened during that holiday. Virtually nothing worth writing in such detail about. Something was brewing, or the police and the decent citizens expected something to brew with a notorious motorcycle gang partying on their doorstep, but nothing happened. Except for a photographer being arrested for trying to do the right thing. The only bright spot in the book was learning about the kind and non-judgmental way people in Bass Lake treated the Angels. Their curiosity made them maybe less cautious than they had reason to be. But in the end, at least these direct witnesses who interacted with the gang members got to see a different side of them than what they all were reading in the papers.
I was close to not finishing the book. When I picked it up again, hoping that there would be some conclusions from which I’d learn something about Hell’s Angels, I regretted that I did. Another scene the author chose to describe in detail was so disturbing that it left me feeling so utterly disgusted that it affected my mood for days.
“…the Angels inhabit a world in which violence is as common as spilled bear…” That much I was able to comprehend. The thing is that ninety-nine per cent of the precedents causing violence they create themselves. The author tried to present us with the analysis of why Hell’s Angels aren’t ‘losers’ but ‘outlaws.’ I won’t claim that he failed. I can only speak about my subjective perception. And I saw nothing in what I read in this book that indicated that Hell’s Angels had any strong principles behind their way of life apart from the unwillingness to put in the effort to achieve anything. I am not saying that everyone should be striving for some standardised collection of must-haves, like a big house in a prestigious neighbourhood, an expensive car, ultra-modern devices, etc. I myself have chosen not to chase after some of these elements. But with Hell’s Angels, it’s deeper than not caring about a conventional lifestyle. They just are – or seemed to me after reading the book – lazy and, on top of that, ignorant of even the things they put on display so the world could identify them with these things. Like swastikas, which they claim to be ‘no more than an antisocial joke, a guaranteed gimmick to bug the squares, the taxpayers.’ Well, it might as well be as they say. But the issue here is that they don’t understand in what way they ‘bug’ us. For people who know a bit more about a swastika symbol and what it represents, it is a very cruel joke indeed.
I seldom regret reading a book. This time, unfortunately, I did.
Eve's Book Diary 
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