Thompson described the birth of gonzo journalism in a 1974 interview with Playboy, saying he was covering the Kentucky Derby on deadline, but "I'd blown my mind, couldn't work".

He claimed: "So finally I just started jerking pages out of my notebook and numbering them and sending them to the printer. I was sure it was the last article I was ever going to do for anybody."

The positive response was overwhelming, which, he said, was like "falling down an elevator shaft and landing in a pool of mermaids".

Iain Sinclair, the British cult writer, said that Thompson had ended up as "quite a conservative figure" in his mountain retreat surrounded by guns.

"I suppose the shock of his death is that he hung on so long, because the ghost of Papa Hemingway was looming over him for a very long time," Sinclair told BBC Radio 4's Today programme. Ernest Hemingway, Thompson's hero, shot himself at his home in Ketchum, Idaho, in July 1961, after his heavy drinking had ruined his health.

The ever-rebellious Thompson was born in the southern state of Kentucky and frequently got into trouble with the law in his early years for drinking and vandalism. His father died when he was 14, and by the age of 18 he had already served time in jail for robbery.

He was enlisted in the US Air Force in 1956 and managed to get assigned as a sports writer for the air base newspaper at Eglin Air Proving Ground in Florida. But he quickly became dissatisfied with the rigours of military routine and his high-jinks led to an honorable discharge after only a year in 1957. He spent several years in Puerto Rico and South America working for various newspapers, mostly as a sports reporter.

Thompson shot to fame in 1966 with the publication of his book Hell's Angels, the story of his infiltration of the then-feared Hell's Angels motorcycle gang, an adventure that got him savagely beaten.

Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas is the apocryphal tale of a wild, drug-fuelled weekend spent in the desert gambling hub of Las Vegas by protagonist Raoul Duke, a thinly-disguised version of Thompson. The adventure was recreated in a 1998 Hollywood film starring Johnny Depp, who visited the author in order to research his role and became friends with the by-now reclusive and writer.

The stories of his heady experiences earned him a popular reputation as a wild-living, hard-drinking, LSD-crazed writer bent on self-destruction. His other works include Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72, a collection of articles he wrote for Rolling Stone magazine while covering the election campaigns of then-president Richard M. Nixon and his opponent, Senator George McGovern.

In 1963, Thompson wed Sandy Conklin, a union that lasted 18 years and produced one child, Juan. He also moved to Woody Creek, where he spent most of the rest of his life.

In 1970 Thompson ran for sheriff in Pitkin County, Colorado, losing by a handful of votes after campaigning for drugs to be decriminalised and Aspen to be renamed Fat City. Since his Republican opponent had a crew cut, Thompson shaved his head entirely and peppered his speeches with the phrase "my long-haired opponent".

His later works included Screwjack and Other Stories, The Proud Highway and his last work, Hey Rube: Blood Sport, the Bush Doctrine, and The Downward Spiral of Dumbness.

Thompson became such an icon that cartoonist Garry Trudeau based the wild character of Duke in his Doonesbury comic strip on him.

Hunter S Thompson - genius or loser? Join the debate

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