Bookarts Calligraphy Type
A Teach-Yourself Guide to Italic Handwriting
The Italic Way to Beautiful Handwriting is your key to mastering the Italic hand in just minutes a day. Originally developed in the early Renaissance as a "speedwriting" technique by Papal scribes who wanted to combine beauty and legibility with speed, Italic handwriting continues to appear today on diplomas, wedding invitations, and other special announcements.
Now through modern teaching methods developed by Fred Eager, this handwriting can be yours. The foundation of the Eager system is a dual approach: you learn calligraphic and cursive simultaneously--one handsome, the other functional--to synthesize a perfect balance. Eager's techniques have been widely used throughout the United States and inspired the resurgence of Italic classes and clubs from coast to coast.
In this step-by-step, trace-and-copy manual, renowned Italic instructor Fred Eager shows how to develop the ideal handwriting--legible and beautiful, yet characteristically your own.
Although handwriting is one of mankind's greatest cultural achievements, written communication today means mostly typing into computers and mobile devices. However, scientists stress that the brain benefits from writing by hand. The author, an acclaimed calligrapher and teacher of penmanship, addresses herself to all those who don't even use pen and paper for their shopping list, but would like to try it (again). Based on scientifically proven methods for cognitive activities, this title discovers and promotes the creative potential of handwriting - and to put it into practice right away on the pages of the book. Well-founded and very colorful, inspiring and yet structured: at the end there is the joy of expressing oneself by means of a personal mark, in a form that is even pleasant to look at. Furthermore, there is also the understanding that handwriting is much more than just the graphic transcription of language, going to the origin of the need for expression.
Illuminated manuscripts from England and France are among the greatest masterpieces of medieval European art. This beautiful new book showcases dozens of the finest examples, many of which have never before been exhibited and are rarely reproduced. It reveals the close artistic and intellectual connections between Anglo-Saxon and Norman England and medieval France, where scribes and illuminators often shared stylistic ideas and subject-matter. Among the manuscripts featured here are gospel-books and saints' lives, histories, and herbals. Together they give rich insights into the culture and beliefs of people in medieval Europe, and they are a significant source of evidence for Anglo-Saxon England in particular. Curators from the British Library in London and the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris have collaborated on a major project to study these manuscripts in detail--this book introduces their findings alongside stunning images.
Some years ago, Oliver Darkshire stepped into the hushed interior of Henry Sotheran Ltd (est. 1761) to apply for a job. Allured by the smell of old books and the temptation of a management-approved afternoon nap, Darkshire was soon unteetering stacks of first editions and placating the store's resident ghost (the late Mr. Sotheran, hit by a tram).
A novice in this ancient, potentially haunted establishment, Darkshire describes Sotheran's brushes with history (Dickens, the Titanic), its joyous disorganization, and the unspoken rules of its gleefully old-fashioned staff, whose mere glance may cause the computer to burst into flames. As Darkshire gains confidence and experience, he shares trivia about ancient editions and explores the strange space that books occupy in our lives--where old books often have strong sentimental value, but rarely a commercial one.
By turns unhinged and earnest, Once Upon a Tome is the colorful story of life in one of the world's oldest bookshops and a love letter to the benign, unruly world of antiquarian bookselling, where to be uncommon or strange is the best possible compliment.
The biography of one of world's most popular typefaces. "Whether one likes Palatino or not, Mr. Bringhurst's book is an instant classic."--The Wall Street Journal
Hermann Zapf was one of the great practitioners of the graphic arts and Palatino is probably the most widely known and used of all Zapf faces. Author Robert Bringhurst traces Palatino's development, with all its infinite permutations, and often invisible refinements through a long and fascinating history of variations and permutations, imitations and conflations--from hot metal, through the brief interlude of film setting and finally into the digital world. It is all here, in encompassing detail: a fully illustrated account of Palatino and its extended family: foundry and Linotype, Michelangelo, Sistina, Aldus, Heraklit, Phidias, Zapf Renaissance, PostScript Palatino, Palatino and Aldus Nova, and Palatino Sans. Included with the text are over 200 illustrations of design sketches, working drawings, smoke proofs and test prints, matrices, foundry and Linotype patterns. But beyond that, the book is an argument that artists who create letters can, and should, be judged by the same standards and held in the same esteem as composers who write music and artists who paint on canvas. Bringhurst asks the question, "Can a penstroke or a letterform be so beautiful it will stop you in your tracks and maybe break your heart?" In this groundbreaking and totally original book, he answers the question: "It can."
A rich exploration of the importance of books and libraries in the ancient world that highlights how humanity's obsession with the printed word has echoed throughout the ages - "Accessible and entertaining." --The Wall Street Journal Long before books were mass-produced, scrolls hand copied on reeds pulled from the Nile were the treasures of the ancient world. Emperors and Pharaohs were so determined to possess them that they dispatched emissaries to the edges of earth to bring them back. When Mark Antony wanted to impress Cleopatra, he knew that gold and priceless jewels would mean nothing to her. So, what did her give her? Books for her library--two hundred thousand, in fact. The long and eventful history of the written word shows that books have always been and will always be a precious--and precarious--vehicle for civilization. Papyrus is the story of the book's journey from oral tradition to scrolls to codices, and how that transition laid the very foundation of Western culture. Award-winning author Irene Vallejo evokes the great mosaic of literature in the ancient world from Greece's itinerant bards to Rome's multimillionaire philosophers, from opportunistic forgers to cruel teachers, erudite librarians to defiant women, all the while illuminating how ancient ideas about education, censorship, authority, and identity still resonate today. Crucially, Vallejo also draws connections to our own time, from the library in war-torn Sarajevo to Oxford's underground labyrinth, underscoring how words have persisted as our most valuable creations. Through nimble interpretations of the classics, playful and moving anecdotes about her own encounters with the written word, and fascinating stories from history, Vallejo weaves a marvelous tapestry of Western culture's foundations and identifies the humanist values that helped make us who we are today. At its heart a spirited love letter to language itself, Papyrus takes readers on a journey across the centuries to discover how a simple reed grown along the banks of the Nile would give birth to a rich and cherished culture.
A history of one of humankind's most resilient and influential technologies over the past millennium--the book. Revelatory and entertaining in equal measure, Portable Magic will charm and challenge literature lovers of all kinds as it illuminates the transformative power and eternal appeal of the written word. Stephen King once said that books are "a uniquely portable magic." Here, Emma Smith takes readers on a literary adventure that spans centuries and circles the globe to uncover the reasons behind our obsession with this captivating object. From disrupting the Western myth that the Gutenberg Press was the original printing project, to the decorative gift books that radicalized women to join the anti-slavery movement, to paperbacks being weaponized during World War II, to a book made entirely of plastic-wrapped slices of American cheese, Portable Magic explores how, when, and why books became so iconic. It's not just the content within a book that compels; it's the physical material itself, what Smith calls "bookhood" the smell, the feel of the pages, the margins to scribble in, the illustrations on the jacket, its solid heft. Every book is designed to influence our reading experience--to enchant, enrage, delight, and disturb us--and our longstanding love affair with books in turn has had direct, momentous consequences across time.
The biography of a central figure in the final era of hot-metal composition and printing
The book and type designer Frederic Warde is remembered today chiefly for his collaboration with Stanley Morison, for producing the singular typeface Arrighi. His life was short (he died in 1939, at the age of only forty-five) but in the previous two decades he had pursued a peripatetic, rollercoaster career that saw him come into contact with most of the leading players in his field, in England, Europe, and America: Bruce Rogers, Mardersteig, Updike, Ruzicka, George Macy, William Kittredge, and, of course, Morison, are just a few of a stellar cast of characters whose lives intersected with his orbit. Until now, as it was scantily documented, Warde is the missing piece in the story of design, type, and printing in the interwar years, and this book will make essential reading for anyone interested in that critical period, one that saw the end of hot-metal and the emergence of graphic design as a distinct profession. Warde laid many false trails about his personal history, but the author has drawn upon a surprisingly large body of surviving documentation to piece together a fascinating picture of his life and of the complex, frustrating, sometimes dislikeable, but often inspiring, figure at its center. The best of Warde's extensive body of work displays a restraint and economy linked with an often striking color sense that feels thoroughly modern in its approach. This output was maintained, sometimes erratically, against the backdrop of Warde's mercurial and fragmented professional and personal life. Polarizing the opinions of those he met, he was unfailingly a prolific, entertaining, and informed letter writer, and his correspondence provides invaluable insights into his world and those around him. Here is a designer's life played out against the backdrop of the boom years of the 1920s, the challenges of the Depression, and the obstacles and opportunities created by his own remarkable, but troubled, genius.
To save ancient Arabic texts from Al Qaeda, a band of librarians pulls off a brazen heist worthy of Ocean's Eleven in this "fast-paced narrative that is...part intellectual history, part geopolitical tract, and part out-and-out thriller" (The Washington Post) from the author of The Falcon Thief. In the 1980s, a young adventurer and collector for a government library, Abdel Kader Haidara, journeyed across the Sahara Desert and along the Niger River, tracking down and salvaging tens of thousands of ancient Islamic and secular manuscripts that were crumbling in the trunks of desert shepherds. His goal: preserve this crucial part of the world's patrimony in a gorgeous library. But then Al Qaeda showed up at the door. "Part history, part scholarly adventure story, and part journalist survey...Joshua Hammer writes with verve and expertise" (The New York Times Book Review) about how Haidara, a mild-mannered archivist from the legendary city of Timbuktu, became one of the world's greatest smugglers by saving the texts from sure destruction. With bravery and patience, Haidara organized a dangerous operation to sneak all 350,000 volumes out of the city to the safety of southern Mali. His heroic heist "has all the elements of a classic adventure novel" (The Seattle Times), and is a reminder that ordinary citizens often do the most to protect the beauty of their culture. His the story is one of a man who, through extreme circumstances, discovered his higher calling and was changed forever by it.
This is the only complete edition available of one of the most famous and most useful books of commercial art ever printed. George Bickham, a noted engraver and calligrapher, first compiled this work back in the 1740's, from the best specimens of 24 of the leading calligraphers of his day. Unfortunately, Bickham published his work in 52 separate parts, over a period of eight years. In Bickham's own day it was difficult to get a complete set of the Universal Penman; today, apart from this edition, it is virtually impossible, for most surviving 18th-century copies lack certain rare plates. This Dover edition, however, contains every plate which Bickham engraved, and each is reproduced from an original so remarkably clear that these modern plates are actually better than most 18th-century originals. This book contains more than 210 full-page plates, each crammed full of beautiful and interesting material. To list only part of its contents: - Over 125 pictorial scenes, clear copperplates of drinking scenes, family scenes, commerce, rustic festivities, duels, more. - Over 200 script pictures, male and female heads, busts, cherubs, griffins, birds, fish, etc. - 19 complete alphabets: round hand, round text, Old English, florid, foliated, and others. - 275 lettered specimens, overlaid with fine flourishes, swirls, spirals, featherings, volutes, etc. - Over 100 panels, frames, cartouches, and other effects Over 950 lettered specimens, with thousands of words that can be lifted right off for reproduction. Individual items in this book are permission-free, and may be used (up to ten items per use) without permission, payment, or credit line. Calligraphers find Bickham the best source for English round-handwriting; commercial artists, advertising directors, and designers all find Bickham first-rate as a source for immediately usable pictures and script that suggests antiquity, quality, and reliability. Craftspeople have found it rich in unusual ideas and motifs, while libraries and art historians find it a wonderful collection of 18th-century pictures illustrating art-life.
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