Remembering Tom Wolfe

Tom Wolfe in his Manhattan apartment

Tom Wolfe, an iconic figure in New Journalism, was born on this day in 1930. With his passing in 2018, the first wave of Gonzo writers - a term coined around 1970 by Hunter S. Thompson to describe a wing of New Journalism advocates - is all but gone, save for Gay Talese. Wolfe's earlier works seem written as much for entertainment as for traditional reportorial honesty and often involve not only the writer's observation but also his participation. And there are those long daydream passages of vivid description that end with a quick snap back to reality. As he worked more and more in fiction his style retained muted elements of the "wildness" that made his early "journalism" amazingly popular into the 1990's. It's been a long way from The Kandy-Colored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby to tackling the Great American Novel for Wolfe. He's always seemed quite happy interpreting the American experience as an outsider looking into other worlds. 

Wolfe's last novel, Back to Blood [2012], was only marginally successful and may lead us to speculate on what the future holds for a successful writer whose life has entered the twilight years. Most of us would like to think there is more compelling reading to come from such a wise observer but better we should leave prediction to heaven and immerse ourselves in the great wealth of observation of the American experience Tom Wolfe assembled for us.

These days Wolfe's impact on journalism still make news but I believe we should always remember his entertaining journalism, especially the work that chronicled our cultural history in the critical years from early 1960's to the mid-1970's. In those years he wrote the following titles:

The Kandy-Colored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby (1965)
The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test (1968)
The Pump House Gang (1968)
Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers (1970)
The New Journalism (1974) edited with E.W. Johnson
The Painted Word (1975)
Mauve Gloves & Madmen, Clutter & Vine (1976)


He capped the 1970's with, The Right Stuff, his fascinating look at the nation's first astronauts, the Mercury Seven, and the program that put most of them into space. Although he had already achieved fame as a writer the publication of The Right Stuff and the film by the same name that followed in 1983 ensured his place in American literature.

In 2012 Wolfe took on the immigration theme and the Cuban-Americans community dominating the scene in Miami. Back to Blood hit the market with high expectations but performed poorly. This article reprinted from New York Magazine appeared with the release of the novel and remains a pleasing blend of biography and book. In August 2016 he published his last book, The Freedom of Speech, an analysis of the work of Charles Darwin and Noam Chomsky.  

In a writing career spanning more than half a century Wolfe left us a personal view of the American scene that, written in the present tense, brings our past alive. I think it's a safe bet that the man who gave us terms including, "the right stuff", "radical chic", the Me Decade", and "good ol' boy" will be read, enjoyed, and remembered for a long, long time.  







Sources

Photos and Illustrations:
Wolfe, New York MagazineText:
wikipedia.org