Words, It's Only Words...

All right. I admit it. I am a word nerd. I can spend as much time selecting fonts and arranging words on the paper as I do writing the poem. Should I use script, or a jagged font, or a nice traditional look? It generally depends on the feel of the piece. Of course, I revert back to the accepted looks whenever I submit for publication, but I feel as if the appearance of the words accentuates what I'm saying.

Therefore, it comes as no surprise, I think, that my daughter gave me for Christmas a book called "Just My Type". I had seen a review, but hadn't mentioned it to anyone. Sarah, however, knows me too well and slid it under the Christmas tree.

I finally got around to starting the book this week, and it is crammed with all sorts of esoteric information about type and the people (men and women) who design or designed it. Stretching back as far as Gutenberg, and as far forward as today, the stories abound. There's the type designer who picks out anachronistic type styles in the movies that he goes to; there's the guy who, to protect the typeface he designed from being used inappropriately by his partner after his death, painstakingly removed every piece, literally bit by bit, as type is notoriously heavy, and dumped it in the Thames, to be lost forever. You have to picture this guy, in his late 70s, hauling packages of type, wrapped in paper and tied with string, and surreptitiously pitching them off bridges in the dark of night. Then there's the guy who decided to see what it would be like to experience a day without Helvetica, rejecting transportation, advertising, television, stores, clothes, food items--anything that bore that typeface.

But, over and above the strange goings-on among type designers, there is the information: where did the ubiquitous typeface in European airports come from? I never thought about the signage on our highways and how fonts contribute to the smooth flow of traffic. I never considered the value of labels in marketing products, or creating an atmosphere. In fact, I am the classic consumer. According to the experts, type should be like a crystal glass--what you should see is the content, not the vehicle that brings it to you. The ultimate success for a type design is that it disappears. At least until someone draws your attention to it.

And this book does just that. It causes you to look around and notice the printed items you encounter every day. Is that Helvetica on that sign? Or is that shop using Caslon? And why did they choose that particular style? It opens up a whole new world, whose existence I never suspected.

You may have noticed that this piece is written in one of my old traditional fonts. I guess I'm waiting till I finish my book to decide which font is me. Stay tuned.