Word: kesey
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THOUGH little of what I have said is explicit in Wolfe's book, many of Kesey's actions do seem to point towards the meanings I've described. In effect these meanings are attributes of the acid experience, and Kesey was among the first to explore...
...WOLFE Ken Kesey is a Christ-like figure, the founder of a new religion. He stands at the center of a band of disciples ("The Merry Pranksters") and interprets for them the meaning of a new experience...
...much of our present situation is the response of fear, of hatred of the unexpected. Wallace's followers are scared of hippies, scared of long hair, scared of blacks, in part simply because they're different. Kesey and the Pranksters could have made a small difference. A prank properly performed could have given people a chance to adapt to the unexpected, to play along with it if they wanted to, to groove...
These political, ethical consequences are implicit in the Prankster way of life, in the experience of acid itself. And perhaps if Kesey hadn't been busted (he eventually served a year's sentence), he could have invented the kinds of pranks that would help people to be less scared of the world and of themselves...
...KESEY'S only explicit political advice was given in a speech to a huge Berkeley peace rally. It was "to say fuck the war and just turn your back on it." This leads Wolfe to an asinine prediction of the "death" of radical politics, the end of organized demonstrations. He not only predicts, but at the end of the book describes this non-event as if it had actually occurred...