TYPOGRAPHY IN THE 19th CENTURY
It was near the close of the nineteenth century when William Morris, the distinguished exponent of strength and simplicity in art, declared that “no good printing has been done since 1550.” According to this statement one hundred years after its invention typography forfeited its place among the esthetic arts, and then for three hundred years remained below the standard set by its inventor. By setting his date at 1550 Morris overlooked the achievements of such eminent printers as Plantin and the Elzevirs, but his arraignment probably had some justification. Posterity had defaulted in its administration of the legacy left by Gutenberg.
The first book printed from separate types, as an example of artistic arrangement and careful workmanship, is a remarkable testimony to the genius of the inventor, especially when the completeness of the invention is compared with the initial productions of later inventors. The first cylinder press and the first linotype machine were both crudely constructed.
Typography attained its highest point toward perfection in Italy in the days of Jenson and Aldus. The Italian style of lettering and decoration differed greatly from the German. There were dignity, refinement, a dainty neatness, in the printed pages of the Venetians, and their type-faces were precise and of a dark-gray tone. The German page, with its bold Gothic letters arranged in masses of black, was characteristic of the religious fidelity and sturdiness of the dwellers on the banks of the Rhine.
As the art of printing spread, the German and Italian styles became mingled, finally resulting during Colonial days in a style of typography which represented the Italian modified by the German just enough to make it interesting. But typography as an art was in a state of deterioration. Even Franklin, called by the printers of America their “Patron Saint,” as a typographer lacked the artistic perception of Aldus and Plantin, altho he was a superior mechanic and a shrewd business man.
The beginning of the nineteenth century found the practice of typography leaning more than ever toward utility and away from art. William Nicholson, an Englishman, had planned a cylinder printing press, and Dr. Kinsley, of Connecticut, had constructed a model of one. A roman type-face on severe, mechanical lines had been designed, and picturesque old romans such as the Caslon were going out of use. Ornaments and borders were being discarded, and the style of typography was getting uninteresting and losing the personal element.
PLEASING BORDER ARRANGEMENT
Letterpress imitation of the decoration of double-column pages on early books. From the “Book of Common Prayer,” London, 1814
To illustrate this transition there are reproduced four representative title-page arrangements. The first is that of a book on printing published in 1810, containing several lines of the then new roman type-face. In arrangement this page is similar to the “Queen Elizabeth” page inserted in the chapter on Colonial typography which is perhaps the source from which came the “long-and-short-line” and “catch-word” style of the average title-page of the nineteenth century. The second example of the group shows a displayed page of 1847 similarly treated, and the third is a reproduction of the title-page of a printer’s manual of 1872. This last-mentioned example is the product of a prominent type foundry of that time and very likely was arranged in the style then accepted as good typography. A more uninteresting page could hardly be conceived, especially in a book intended for printers.