“By early 1956 . . . I could draw a straight line with a steel T
square, for example. I could do simple pasteups and mechanicals. I
could ‘spec’ type and do some primitive lettering. . . . I knew about
repro proofs and photostats and Photo Lettering. I was trusted to black
out cut lines on negative photostats, to cut mats, to ‘gang’ various
small pieces of art for photostats. I managed to keep the job and was
even given a small raise.
    But at night in the dark, alone with myself, graphic
design seemed a chilly discipline. It was basically a function of the
intellect, and I was still in the sweaty grip of romance, full of
Hemingway, reading the poems of Garcia Lorca, soaking up James M. Cain,
discovering the drawing of Heinrich Kley, copying George Grosz and
Orozco. I still loved drawing human bodies, hair and teeth and flesh. I
had much less interest in squares, circles, triangles, or the
delicacies of Caslon Bold.”

—Pete Hamill, A Drinking Life: A Memoir, 1994.