Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

Chip Kidd was born in Reading, PA in 1964. He lives in New York City and Stonington, CT.

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Fresh out of college in the summer of 1961, Happy lands his first job as a graphic designer (okay, art assistant) at a small Connecticut advertising agency populated by a cast of endearing eccentrics. Life for Happy seems to be -- well, happy. But when he's assigned to design a newspaper ad recruiting participants for an experiment in the Yale Psychology Department, Happy can't resist responding to the ad himself. Little does he know that the experience will devastate him, forcing a reexamination of his past, his soul, and the nature of human cruelty -- chiefly, his own. Written in sharp, witty prose and peppered with absorbing ruminations on graphic design, The Learners again shows that Chip Kidd's writing is every bit as original, stunning, and memorable as his celebrated book jackets.

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The Learners

HarperCollins Publishers, Inc.

Chapter One

1961

October.

We'll be right back, after this:

I was in the shower when I realized where I'd gone wrong. That's a cliché now, I know, but it wasn't then. Back then it was wildly new and my idea, and I would have copyrighted it had I foreseen it would become so popular, but well—as with so many things, who knew? Anyway, there I was, the water drilling away, its wet warmth my amniotic tide, the shower curtain a plastic, plaid uterine wall. Then it occurs to me, like a gift from God: Shoes are our friends.

Our friends.

Not just our acquaintances, the occasional giggly aunt and bald uncle over for dinner, the neighbors down the hall you have to say hello to—but the confidants we carefully screen and select over the course of a lifetime, our intimates. The ones who shield us from the slush, the sludge, the world's dirt underfoot. But their love is not unconditional. We have a bargain to keep. If we are good to them, they'll give us everything they have, right down to their pocked, worn soles. Incredible.

Yes, this was news.

Clearly, I would have to change my strategy . . .

Excerpted from The Learnersby Chip Kidd Copyright © 2009 by Chip Kidd. Excerpted by permission.
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