The New Journalism of the Sixties
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important activities going on in contemporary civilization, then he ought to
move on to something else he thinks is .. Z'17
Although a number of journalists have experimented with these
impressionistic techniques of reportage, this article will examine the works of
five writers who attempted to chronicle the fragmentation of American culture
in the 1960s. In so doing, they placed into question the worth of conventional
forms of reporting that rely on objectivity, a formulaic approach to newswriting,
and the neutral observer who strives not to become part of the story. The
following works were selected because of their focus on specific historical
events of the Sixties, or their emphasis on subcultures of that decade: Joan
Didion’s Slouching Towards Bethlehem and The White Album, Tom Wolfe’s
The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby and The Electric KoolAid Acid Test, Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas: A
Savage Journey to the Heart o f the American Dream, Normal Mailer’s The
Armies o f the Night and Miami and the Siege o f Chicago, and Michael Herr’s
Dispatches. Each of these works hinge thematically on the recognition that the
conventional ways of confronting social reality in contemporary America no
longer apply. For the New Journalists of the Sixties, notions of an empirical
reality rang hollow in the midst of a society that was tearing itself apart by
assassinations, riots, racism, sexism, and a proxy war in Southeast Asia that
killed and maimed thousands of American soldiers. Instead, writers like Didion,
Wolfe, Thompson, Mailer, and Herr recognized that only a subjective reality
could begin to make sense out of a society in which chaos and disorder
dominated the headlines and the evening news.
Social Fragmentation: The Essays of Joan Didion
In their pursuit of the social reality of the Sixties, the New Journalists
thematically focused on, to varying degrees, the widening fissures in
contemporary American culture. These fissures symbolize an America that was
socially, politically, and spiritually adrift. Jhe fullest treatment of this theme is
expressed in Joan Didion *s collections of essays, Slouching Towards Bethlehem
and The White Album. Here, she seeks the evidence of atomization18—the proof
that everything eventually falls apart. Although establishing her reputation as a
novelist, Didion turns to the impressionistic essay to try to come to grips with
societal disorder.19 For her, the center of American society was no longer
holding. Divisions ran so deep in the Sixties that, from Didion’s perspective,
uncertainty, chaos, and a sense of aimlessness haunted the American spirit. She
places herself at the focal point of most of these essays, underscoring her own
inability to make sense out of a badly fragmented society. Only by coming to
grips with the disorder in her own life could she begin to understand the chaos
occurring throughout society. In fact, Didion notes that writing the title essay
from Slouching Towards Bethlehem was an emotionally cathartic experience:
I was in fact as sick as I have ever been when I was wri F