Hunter S. Thompson shot himself in the head on Sunday. He was 67. That link is from MTV.com, because such madness amuses me. I haven't read much by Thompson, aside from a few articles for ESPN.com's Page 2, so Thompson was never one of my influences. He was a guy who had a book that was turned into a movie with Johnny Depp in it that I've never seen, and occasionally wrote for ESPN. Also, I remember reading that he liked the San Francisco 49ers. Whether he wrote those words or I just imagined them, Thompson is forever linked in my mind to that team. I had the opportunity to get a copy of Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 while at a Borders book store just north of the Caltrain station in San Francisco. I did not avail myself at the time, and now I wish I had. I hate feeling like I'm reading something just because they died.

Warren Ellis comments on Thompson here. Warren's work has influenced me heavily, which is sad because I've mostly read only his comics. Ellis was influenced by Thompson, as evidenced by Transmetropolitan's headlining character, Spider Jerusalem, the mad, drug-swilling journalist. Which is what Thompson was. Ellis creates what is, to my mind, the best of the commentary on Thompson's life and especially his death. Thompson was a brilliant artist whose work I will now not be able to read without the subtext that "this man killed himself." It's something I know about, say, Hemingway; but I can distance myself from Hemingway's suicide since Hell, it's been that way for as long as I cared about it. It is the Way It Always Was. For Thompson, it will be the Way Things Should Not Be.

And this seems horribly self centred while commenting on a man who just died. But these are my thoughts, and Thompson has had no direct impact on my life. My heart goes out to his family, who no doubt discovered his body. At the same time, I had no idea he had a family until he died. He was not a person to me, just a persona.

I will read Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail. Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Hell's Angels. Hey Rube. Perhaps I will learn he is the most brilliant author humankind has ever known. Perhaps I will learn something else. But I am confident either way that this man, who ended his own life, still has something to teach me.