EXAMPLE 430
Caslon typography on a magazine. By Will Bradley
Christmas feature treatment is also found in Example [425], also by Will Bradley. The text letter used in this example for initials and headings is hardly suitable for use generally in periodicals, but for occasional features it is not out of place.
Verse when used will usually look more interesting set in italic, especially when the italic has a decorative quality. One of the important general magazines sets verse in Kennerley italic in a decorative panel broken into the text page at a suitable point.
Important parts of an article reprinted in an attractive panel on the same page would call attention to the article and invite reading.
A certain amount of restraint is necessary when planning typographic features for periodicals. Type-faces should be selected with knowledge and care, and seldom should large sizes be used. “Jobby” display effects are never in order on the text pages of periodicals.
The Advertisements.—The typographic details of the editorial section of a national periodical in the field of advertising were recently revised and made more pleasing, yet when made up and printed the work that had been done was so overshadowed and counteracted by the bold types on the advertising pages that the general result was disappointing.
It is useless to attempt good typography on periodicals so long as advertisements are inserted in text pages or occupy facing positions; that is, it is useless unless the periodicals set or reset the advertisements neatly in good taste as is done by the Curtis publications.
Advertisements should not be mingled with text matter. According to old-fashioned ideas, the reader buys a periodical for the text matter, and it is for him to determine whether or not he shall read the advertising pages. In some publications the text pages are yet to be found intact, altho preceded and followed by sold space; in others good resolves peter out as text meets advertisement toward the rear, and in others—a majority perhaps—advertisements dominate almost all of the text pages.
Treatment of advertisements in periodicals need not necessarily be shy and timid; neither need it be blustering and noisy. Where advertisements are neatly treated and not unduly forced on the attention, readers are likely to give as much time to their perusal as to the text pages. A gentlemanly solicitor who talks clearly in low tones is more likely to sell goods than one who disturbs the entire office by his loud talk and boisterous demeanor. Apply this to the typography of the advertising pages.