Ralph Steadman on Hunter S. Thompson's Art, Poetry, and Mean Streak

Illustration for 'The Kentucky Derby is Decadent and Depraved', 1970

Print on paper, 27 x 21 cm

Well, apparently, I wasn't the guy I was supposed to meet [Hunter S. Thompson] in the kentucky derby not at all. It was supposed to be Pat Oliphant. I had never heard of Hunter Thompson, but I remember when we met, he said, “What's that weird growth on your chin, Ralph?” I had a bit of a beard at the time. I told him it was a beard, and he said, “Well, I wouldn't leave it there. You look like tangled hair with warts. I'd take it out on you.”

He was a year younger than me. He was the strangest man. He literally said, “I'd feel really trapped in this life, Ralph, if I didn't know I could kill myself at any moment,” which of course he did. And that kind of hung around for years, that possibility of doing it at some point.

Absolutely, [the Kentucky Derby assignment] it was a strange kind of exercise or training for me because I had never met someone like him before. I noticed right away that he was different. He was just saying things that were off center. And his use of language was pretty good. So I thought he was someone interesting that I might as well get along with. And so it worked.

I used to make little sketches in a notebook or sketchbook and he loved seeing what we did. It was something that intrigued him as well. I wasn't writing words. I was writing scribbles, notes and such.

There were a lot of people around trying to sell you horse tips. He wanted me to stay out of it.