Goudy, not Gaudy

It's time for confession: I have yet to design and compose and print a project of my own.

In the Introductory Workshop, back when it was Press Club, I designed and set the type for a quote to put on a postcard. I finished late in the semester (way back in Freshman year), so I did not get a chance to print it. However, I have had plenty of experience in designing within a group, composing composing composing (and distributing x 3), and printing.

A few weeks ago, a certain notion thundered its way into my skull: I have access to the most rewarding form of vanity publishing. Hooray! Over the course of a month or so, I'll be scraping together my free time to design, compose, and print one of my very own poems. Did I mention I'm an "aspiring" poet? Or that I feel that "aspiring" is a rather frustrating term. I am a student poet who aspires to publication, but I am still a poet. And an artist. But that is a rant for another day.

What's strange is that by writing about the project here and posting a picture of the finished product, I'm sort of publishing the same work twice. As far as distribution of the physical product... if my family reads this blog, I'm spoiling their Christmas surprise. But in all sincerity, the project is primarily an exercise, a portfolio piece, and the expression of a desire to see my own writing in print.

I kick-started the process several weeks ago. I chose the poem, and then set about finding a font for the body.

It's absolutely useless to begin setting text only to later find that you've run out of the letter 'e,' or similar. My poem contains almost one hundred 'e's. So I limited myself to type cases that were brimming with letters.

This meant that my selection was essentially restricted to the more famous, well-stocked typefaces. I went with the standard 12 point size for two reasons: we have more variety in the 12 and 14 point ranges, and 14 felt too big for an already bulky poem of 35 lines. Italic would make it too delicate and bold would again be too bulky.

But here, elegance and readability, my next two essentials, were on my side. Most of the popular fonts are popular for good reasons. What took effort was the search for a font that was a little more unique. Caslon and Goudy found themselves neck and neck in the race for my favor for the simple reason that I could find neither in the font list of my copy of Microsoft Word. I considered in particular the Old Style forms of each font family because "Old Style" sounded fancier, an assumption that proved true.

Pacing the cramped basement for the fifteenth time, I told myself I could not afford to spend three hours on the selection of a font, and since I already had, I certainly could not afford a fourth. I brought the Goudy up to the Print Shop to examine directly against the Caslon. The letter 'g' sold it. Caslon's has a little serif that looks like a bulbous nose; Goudy's sweeps up and comes to a delicate point.

[Picture of g's here]

The next step is to set the type.