Thirty-Five years ago, I was one of the unhappiest lads in New York. I was selling motor-trucks for a
living. I didn’t know what made a motor-truck run. That wasn’t all: I didn’t want to know. I despised
my job. I despised living in a cheap furnished room on West Fifty-sixth Street-a room infested with
cockroaches. I still remember that I had a bunch of neckties hanging on the walls; and when I reached
out of a morning to get a fresh necktie, the cockroaches scattered in all directions. I despised having to
eat in cheap, dirty restaurants that were also probably infested with cockroaches.
I came home to my lonely room each night with a sick headache-a headache bred and fed by
disappointment, worry, bitterness, and rebellion. I was rebelling because the dreams I had nourished
back in my college days had turned into nightmares. Was this life? Was this the vital adventure to
which I had looked forward so eagerly? Was this all life would ever mean to me-working at a job I
despised, living with cockroaches, eating vile food-and with no hope for the future? … I longed for
leisure to read, and to write the books I had dreamed of writing back in my college days.