Abstract
This paper is part of a PhD research project which is in its final year. The aim of this research is to investigate and analyse how traditional poetry has been handled in books, in England, in terms of typographic development. The research examines the binary structure of the poem on the page, that is to say the opposing features of printed text and the space around it. In particular, it focuses on segmentation, which is the visible division of the text into units that, to a greater or lesser extent, reflects its underlying structure. This paper discusses conventions which have been established by typographers and manuals and attempts to further understanding about why such conventions were developed within poetry. It provides an overview of how the earliest printer’s manuals viewed poetry and how they offered suggestions as to printing rules. It then moves on to discuss how subsequent books on typography and manuals of style have treated the same issues. This paper shows that, although traditional poetry is a distinctive type of text characterised by regular meters and fixed poetic forms, books about typography and manuals of style have always treated this subject superficially.
Keywords
N/A
Citation
Pacheco, H. (2006) Conventions of Typography Related to Traditional Poetry, in Friedman, K., Love, T., Côrte-Real, E. and Rust, C. (eds.), Wonderground - DRS International Conference 2006, 1-4 November, Lisbon, Portugal. https://dl.designresearchsociety.org/drs-conference-papers/drs2006/researchpapers/12
Conventions of Typography Related to Traditional Poetry
This paper is part of a PhD research project which is in its final year. The aim of this research is to investigate and analyse how traditional poetry has been handled in books, in England, in terms of typographic development. The research examines the binary structure of the poem on the page, that is to say the opposing features of printed text and the space around it. In particular, it focuses on segmentation, which is the visible division of the text into units that, to a greater or lesser extent, reflects its underlying structure. This paper discusses conventions which have been established by typographers and manuals and attempts to further understanding about why such conventions were developed within poetry. It provides an overview of how the earliest printer’s manuals viewed poetry and how they offered suggestions as to printing rules. It then moves on to discuss how subsequent books on typography and manuals of style have treated the same issues. This paper shows that, although traditional poetry is a distinctive type of text characterised by regular meters and fixed poetic forms, books about typography and manuals of style have always treated this subject superficially.