The Story of Writing

The Story of Writing is a scholarly, yet immensely readable, survey of how written languages came into being. From the emergence of the alphabet in ancient civilizations to letterforms of the twentieth century, we see how the tools and materials available to the people of each era shaped the way letters and pages were created. The author skillfully turns our attention to western civilization and the Greek and Roman influence on what became the English alphabet. Later chapters bring us through the development of writing in the dark ages, the middle ages, then into the machine age with the invention of the printing press and copperplate engraving. Of this later period, Jackon writes: ''When the calligraphers were not fighting for recognition... they were fighting each other. In 1595 two English calligraphers, Peter Bailes and Daniel Johnson, took part in a trial of penmanship, competing for a prize of 'a golden pen of twentie pounds.' Johnson, a bad loser, afterwards published a manifesto protesting that the jury had been rigged, and Bailes counter-charged with a denunciation of his own.... It was a sad spectacle, for whatever their public antics the skills of these masters and of their engravers were without doubt immense. The Renaissance scribes of Italy had never needed to compete with a machine, or with the razzle-dazzle of the engraver's slick allure which placed a barrier between the pen and the page. The chain was broken, and the writing master postured on the stage of a sideshow, teaching children, producing elaborate citations and squabbling with his rivals, while the other arts drew still further away from him.'' The book is filled with both black-and-white and color illustrations of samples of manuscripts, tools, and hand-made letters. The illustrations alone make this book a valuable addition to the artist's library, as well as to the historian's. Calligraphers and others who love beautiful writing will be fascinated at every turn of the page. Teachers of language, history, calligraphy, art and design will find themselves returning to this book again and again for references and examples.