Rating: 
Summary: Read it at least once...
Review: If you have ever taken a spiritual journey (chemically induced or other), this book will replay the experience verbatim, although the words may look a little different. Before thinking of this as glorifying the 60s LSD culture, realize too that the downside of the 60s counterculture is presented, if not directly, through the consequences of the actors in the drama. The ultimate judgment is left up to the reader. Were Kesey and his Merry Pranksters heroes? Were they merely full of themselves, empowered by LSD? You decide. But man, what a ride! (FYI: This a review posted under my old email address from 1999)
Rating:
Summary: Changed my life
Review: I do not lie; this book literally changed my life. It introduced me to the concept of serendipity and how there really are no such things as coincidences. Every time I read the book, events magically happen which only further reinforce my belief. Traveling intrepidly. On the bus. Going Furthur. It's all there--just pick up the book and read it.
Rating:
Summary: Thank you Mr. Wolfe
Review: A psychedelic adventure into days long passed, the story of Ken Kesey and his merry pranksters is one not to miss. Tom wolfe the master story teller envelops the reader into a story of a revolution, of Acid, individuals and ideas taking place in the magical world of the 60's that we of the younger generation cannot understand. As a member of the younger generation who wasn't around to experience the world as it was then, it gladens me that Mr Wolfe has compiled a description of how others may have seen it when they were there. each character, each location is meticulously set out so the reader can truly understand the world as it twisted and turned around these people, how they didn't change for society, but society changed for them. Thank you Mr. Wolfe i enjoyed it thoroughly.
Rating:
Summary: I love Kool-Aid, and Acid is not too bad either...
Review: Tom Wolfe's version of how Ken and the other Merry Pranksters pulled off the Acid revolution is phenominal. Before the book was over I not only wanted to try Acid for myself but was pissed off because I wasn't even alive to experience the acid tests. The Grateful Dead is my favorite band, and knowing that they participated in, and helped progress, the Pranksters' movement just strengthened my respect for ALL of the bandmates. This movie is a great look at what really happened in the 60s and what all of the people my age missed out on!
Rating:
Summary: Electric Kool-Aid for a gnome
Review: The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test This is a documentary by a fabulous journalist and author Tom Wolfe. Wolfe got into the world of hippies from the sixties. In this documentary about Ken Kesey, the author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, it describes the actions and tribulations that these "merry Pranksters" endured and enjoyed. In the book, a small band of "free thinkers" soon become united into an everlasting bond, which is created by one thing, DRUGS. In the novel it tells the whole story of how acid got started amongst California and the United States and it pretty much started with the pranksters. And they soon learn that the law is a very difficult source to bypass. They suffer through the jail, the raids, and being on the run; all to come back together and hallucinate. For the pranksters it was all about the experience which all came from inside their heads and the acid that was fed to them. They go on many adventures, including trips across the country in the stereotypical hippie bus. It tells of their insane journeys through bad experiences while bending their mind with hallucinogenic drugs. And the parties in which are invited many different kind of people including the Hell's Angels. The pranksters also held what they liked to call "Acid Tests" in which they could spread the experience of LSD to all that were interested. It is an amazing story, especially how it is describing these young psyche expanders. The author Tom Wolfe did a great job describing the lives of these young hippies in their experience through the drug movement of America. He told the story from an almost documentary point of view in which he could partially become part of the pranksters. Wolfe could make you believe in their movement with the click of his typewriter. He got inside the mind of each of the prankster's in-order to properly explicate their lives correctly. He could use the proper language and communication to securely tell the story of these merry pranksters. His communication of the matter gave it a feeling that the book was alive, that this isn't only a documentary but pure vitality in form. Wolfe accomplished this book by a process in which he used past experiences of his own self and past experiences of others. He interviewed pranksters; and he spent much time interviewing people who were part of the prankster's lives' even if it was only for a night. And during the end of the Prankster career days he even spent time living with them. He took time out of his life to become part of this Day-Glo essence of life. This Day-Glo world full of colors, patterns, and mind trips; that's what Wolfe got himself into. Even if you disagree with the thoughts and views of the pranksters this is still a tale full of excitement, not to mention how well written it is. I do not know if Wolfe took part in the entertainment that enthralled the Pranksters; he could have stayed sober, I am unaware. This is a great book for any reader who enjoys hearing about something new. Because after you read this you will understand the hippies. -gnome
Rating:
Summary: Wolfe takes us on a wild ride
Review: Wolfe reports on Ken Kesey's Merry Pranksters during the late 1960s. Simply following the crazy antics of these drug-inspired hippies isn't enough for Wolfe. His writing style mimics the Pranksters manic frolicking.
Rating: 
Summary: The Electric Kool-Aid Wolfe ExPeRiEnCe
Review: A tom Wolfe sits/ /Among Kesey;s sheeps The prankster's pack interrogated;;;;;;anit- Black shiney FbI shoes-ish/ A Wolfe that can dig the experience without bein' part of it/ Wolfe watches/ Politely passing on Acid K-Aid;;;;takes notes/ With Pens srible-ible-ible-ing/ Watching pl-acid- Prankster's scene / Animated?Kesey/ Explains far out experiences ,. Others blinded/ Kesey tripped up messiah of sixties anit-pop culture;;/ ;;Haight Ashbury Christ&Budda&Muhammed charismatic acid head/ He who wrote One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Sometimes a/ Great Notion/ Going where no nosey reporters dare go/ Amid drugs and Hell's Angels and Dylan and johnGeorgeringo and thatotherguy/ Now tom Wolfe's Merry Prankster epic begins amid the Day-Glow faceplate of sixties rebel America/ Tom Wolfe uses language not grounded on moldy English textbooks, but on people's perceptions and unconscious;;Whole-istic;;views. In fact unless you scrutinize very carefully, you won't even notice the effects that Wolfe's writing style has on your mind. Here's an example for the unread. "Babb's, saying, 'Yes, it's all so very obvious.' It's all so very obvious..." and it is. This excerpt was the part that really broke through to me. Actually IT wasn't obvious, IT was why the Vietnam war started. Everyone talking about IT was zonked out of their gourds and Ginsberg, acid head and sometimes eastern mystik had decided that all wars are started by misunderstandings which the stereo stypical burned out Vietnam vet, Babbs, answqrs with a: But of course! Yet this statement can be not true, yet Wolfe lets the part hang, like he's saying: it's obvious to them, it would be to you if you're acid-fried-jet-lagged. Wolfe's writing does something that most fiction writter's have been trained and culled and trained again not to do. Give away your personality through you're writing. Not only does he pull it off in a slick hipstercat sort of way, but manages to keep the unspoken rule among Literary non-fiction writters: "Never talk about yourself. Why your doing this story:fine:How are you doing this story:fine: but not who is doing this story :::definately not:::. Wolfe's Creativeenglish is at it's best in The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. A story of the once acclaimed One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest author Ken Kesey and his band of movie-filming-variable lag-acid hippies the Merry Pranksters, their history;their theory; and their Intrepid Trip through America's ShineyBlackShoe and WhiteCollar world. Much like the acid detailed in the story, this book is an experience. It would be impossible to explain the book in any terms that wouldn't be unwieldy psychological jargon. Wolfe's depth of character understanding shines the most through all of the story. He has synched his mind into the Prankster's psychedelic/low rent/communal living induced group mind without the need of the experience as Kesey calls the hallucinogenic state of being. The prankster's have no need for words. They know what they are talking about and can explain it to other pranksters with looks and gestures but never words. As Wolfe explains: "... that huge afternoon sun like a huge thousand-eyed thing pulsing explosions of sunlight in exact time to the weird Arab music -and in that moment Kesey, Mountain Girl, Sandy, Zonker, all of them-No one even had to look at another because they not only know that everyone else is seeing it at once, they feel, they feel it flowing through one brain, " Wolfe puts it in terms laymen can understand. He quantifies the experience for those who need quantification to understand. He puts words to Kesey's mind.
Rating:
Summary: Vivid
Review: Tom Wolfe is not a hippie. Through this book, however, he succesfully showed us what an ideal hippie life would be like, and the expierences hippies encounter. Be it a Day-Glo paint-splashed forest or an LSD addict who eventually leaves The Bus (the mode of transportation Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters use which contains a water cooler laced with LSD), or a visit from the Hell's Angels, this book is intense and interesting. Do not start it on a busy day, you'll lose track of time while reading this masterpiece.
Rating:
Summary: A trip worth taking
Review: Language in the right hands is still one of mankinds greatest tools. Better than the music, the films, the libraries filled with analyses, the reminiscences of great Ken and Mountain Girl themselves, does Tom Wolfe allow one to step into the early, and authentic hippie world. His book is an example of objective journalism worthy of a place in the realm of fine literature. His hippies are no heroes or villains. They are no geniuses, but certainly no fools either. Their philosophy of the "now" is painted in all colors of the day glow rainbow. Most importantly, Wolfe uses this encounter with this alternative view of life to make you wonder how normal "normal" life really is. One for the ages.
Rating:
Summary: A great look into the beyond
Review: This book is about how LSD can essentially take a person into the beyond and how Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters did just that. Excellently written to reflect how the mood of the moment was. A must read for anyone wishing to expand their view of society or maybe see it from a different view.
|
