( 2 reviews )
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( 1 of 2 found this review helpful ) Posted: Jun 4 2007
I bought this book, thinking it would educate me about the different kinds of type and how the edesign of type evolved. This is an interesting book, but it's mostly a history book about the people who designed type and does not focus on their innovations. I'd recommend a book more focused on design "Elements of Typographic Style" if you are looking for a book about type itself. I'd retitle it to "The Secret History of the people behind Letters"
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( 11 of 11 found this review helpful ) Posted: Oct 9 2005
Even though I'm not a typographer or type-designer, when I began engaging in desktop publishing a decade ago and sought out guidance for the decisions I suddenly had to make, I became interested in the history and minutiae of fonts and letterforms for their own sake. Also, in pursuit of a master's degree in library science more than thirty years ago, I took an elective in the "History of Books and Printing," so the background knowledge was already there. Loxley has produced a thoroughly fascinating social and philosophical history of the development of type, beginning with Gutenberg (who may or may not have been the inventor of moveable type) and following the development of words-in-print down through the centuries to the Nazi affection for Blackletter and the present-day democratization of the field via the personal computer. The author is very knowledgeable, especially about biographical details and personalities among western type designers. Illustrations and quotations are frequent and the book itself, naturally, is very nicely designed with footnotes and cut-lines set off in a one-third-size outside column. Though this is Loxley's first book, I hope it won't be his last.
