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The Learners: A Novel

by Chip Kidd

The Learners: A Novel Cover

 

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:

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.

Review:

"A sequel to book designer Kidd's first novel, The Cheese Monkeys, this beautifully composed paean to pre-computer graphic design pitches recent graduate Happy (his nickname), now 21, into the mercantile halls of down-at-the-heels New Haven ad agency Spears, Rakoff and Ware. Kidd paints the agency with all the customary conventions of a mid-century office culture farce: lacquered secretaries, lunchtime scotches and broken-down businessmen. Happy wiles away his time in blissful drudgery until he fields a call for designing a tiny ad for a seemingly innocuous psychological study. The study is being run by (real-life psychologist) Stanley Milgram, and Happy is unable to resist volunteering; little surprise for readers that Happy finds himself a participant in Milgram's notorious Obedience to Authority experiment, playing the role of 'The Teacher' who is ordered to shock 'The Learner' with near-lethal doses of electricity. Though character development is less the point than jokes about behaviorism and old school office culture's last gasps, the experiment teaches Happy more than he ever hoped to know. The jokes are sometimes dippy, and some of the typographical pyrotechnics are on the twee side. But Kidd's ebullience and generosity in unpacking the art and practice of graphic design carry the novel." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

Review:

"Kidd invents a banter-filled workplace worthy of Howard Hawks, gleefully tweaks the old-guard panic of the Mad Men-era ad world, and even throws in a few typographic bells and whistles (consider page 62's layout a mini-master class). (Grade: A-)" Entertainment Weekly

Review:

"Whimsical, at times bordering on fey, but also keen-edged and original." Kirkus Reviews

Review:

"[A]n amusing and thought-provoking new novel also set in the early 1960s, concerning the dueling creatives, account managers, executives and clients of Spear, Rakoff & Ware, a tiny, behind-the-times agency struggling to stay afloat in the Ivy League shadows of New Haven." Newsday

Review:

"This new novel by the Stonington writer and graphic designer proves that his fiction is just as smart and lively as the covers, typography and layout of the books he designs, which include this one..." Hartford Courant

Review:

"The Learners is dark as India Ink and its fine lines are sure and sharp and funny. As in life, people behave badly, and truly, and are only occasionally redeemed but often sorry. Kidd has created an unexpected narrative voice that moves and provokes and a novel that is, startlingly and even sweetly, not like anything else." Amy Bloom, author of Away

Review:

"This gleefully roguish satire of 1960's advertising-gone-mad is delightfully shrewd, droll and urbane. And any novel that includes the phrase 'bloated dirtpig' and features the beloved Milgram Experiments earns a place on my shelf. A must-read for the ambitious, creative, or chemically unbalanced." Augusten Burroughs

Review:

"This story isn't simply told. It's painted. And the true treasure of The Learners is the ultra-stylized, deco-vision view that comes from staring at the world through Chip Kidd's forever-impressionable eyes. Blurbs always lie; this one's true. When you're done, you will see the world differently." Brad Meltzer, author of The Book of Fate
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About the Author

Chip Kidd is associate art director at Alfred A. Knopf. His first novel, The Cheese Monkeys, was a national bestseller and a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. He is the editor-at-large for Pantheon and the author of Peanuts: The Art of Charles M. Schulz, Batman Collected, and others. He lives in New York City and Stonington, Connecticut.
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Table of Contents

Contents

1961
  (October.)
We'll be right back, after this.  
1961
I. Before.   
  (August, June.)
II. During.  
  (September.)
III. After.  
  (September-November.)

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What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 1 comment:
Mick, August 21, 2008 (view all comments by Mick)
Chip Kidd continues the post coming of age life of Happy, a fledgling graphic designer, and presently not living up to his nickname. He lands his first job in the small ad house of his choice, finds a wonderful mentor, and learns about life in the "real" world. The characters are engaging, the situations are fun, sad, mundane, and real, the writing is very clever. Its also gives insight into the thinking and working of life in the small ad life. There's one sequence that could serve as primer to creating busy print ads. The novel is a sequel to the delightful The Cheese Monkeys, but stands alone very well, also.
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780743255240
Subtitle:
A Novel
Author:
Kidd, Chip
Publisher:
Scribner
Subject:
Literary
Subject:
General Fiction
Subject:
Graphic design (Typography)
Subject:
Experimental fiction
Subject:
Psychological fiction
Subject:
Mystery fiction
Copyright:
2008
Edition Number:
1st
Publication Date:
February 2008
Binding:
Hardback
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Pages:
272
Dimensions:
7.5 x 5.12 in 14.42 oz
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Related Aisles

The Learners: A Novel Used Hardcover
0 stars - 0 reviews
$3.50 In Stock
Product details 272 pages Scribner Book Company - English 9780743255240 Reviews:
"Publishers Weekly Review" by , "A sequel to book designer Kidd's first novel, The Cheese Monkeys, this beautifully composed paean to pre-computer graphic design pitches recent graduate Happy (his nickname), now 21, into the mercantile halls of down-at-the-heels New Haven ad agency Spears, Rakoff and Ware. Kidd paints the agency with all the customary conventions of a mid-century office culture farce: lacquered secretaries, lunchtime scotches and broken-down businessmen. Happy wiles away his time in blissful drudgery until he fields a call for designing a tiny ad for a seemingly innocuous psychological study. The study is being run by (real-life psychologist) Stanley Milgram, and Happy is unable to resist volunteering; little surprise for readers that Happy finds himself a participant in Milgram's notorious Obedience to Authority experiment, playing the role of 'The Teacher' who is ordered to shock 'The Learner' with near-lethal doses of electricity. Though character development is less the point than jokes about behaviorism and old school office culture's last gasps, the experiment teaches Happy more than he ever hoped to know. The jokes are sometimes dippy, and some of the typographical pyrotechnics are on the twee side. But Kidd's ebullience and generosity in unpacking the art and practice of graphic design carry the novel." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)
"Review" by , "Kidd invents a banter-filled workplace worthy of Howard Hawks, gleefully tweaks the old-guard panic of the Mad Men-era ad world, and even throws in a few typographic bells and whistles (consider page 62's layout a mini-master class). (Grade: A-)"
"Review" by , "Whimsical, at times bordering on fey, but also keen-edged and original."
"Review" by , "[A]n amusing and thought-provoking new novel also set in the early 1960s, concerning the dueling creatives, account managers, executives and clients of Spear, Rakoff & Ware, a tiny, behind-the-times agency struggling to stay afloat in the Ivy League shadows of New Haven."
"Review" by , "This new novel by the Stonington writer and graphic designer proves that his fiction is just as smart and lively as the covers, typography and layout of the books he designs, which include this one..."
"Review" by , "The Learners is dark as India Ink and its fine lines are sure and sharp and funny. As in life, people behave badly, and truly, and are only occasionally redeemed but often sorry. Kidd has created an unexpected narrative voice that moves and provokes and a novel that is, startlingly and even sweetly, not like anything else."
"Review" by , "This gleefully roguish satire of 1960's advertising-gone-mad is delightfully shrewd, droll and urbane. And any novel that includes the phrase 'bloated dirtpig' and features the beloved Milgram Experiments earns a place on my shelf. A must-read for the ambitious, creative, or chemically unbalanced."
"Review" by , "This story isn't simply told. It's painted. And the true treasure of The Learners is the ultra-stylized, deco-vision view that comes from staring at the world through Chip Kidd's forever-impressionable eyes. Blurbs always lie; this one's true. When you're done, you will see the world differently."
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