Chapter Excerpt

I Wear the Black Hat
One should judge a man mainly from his depravities. Virtues can be faked. Depravities are real.

— Klaus Kinski, super nihilist.

I’m gonna quote a line from Yeats, I think it is: “The best lack all conviction, while the best are filled” . . . oh, no. It’s the other way around. “The best lack all conviction, and the worst are filled with a passionate intensity.” Now, you figure out where I am.

— Lou Reed, super high.

I’m not a good guy. I mean, I don’t hurt anybody. But I don’t help, either.

— Louis C.K., super real.

Excerpted from I Wear the Black Hat: Grappling with Villains (Real and Imagined) by Chuck Klosterman
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