How Typography Happens

by Ruari McLean

. 2000, bright clean copy, no markings, Professional booksellers since 1981

Paperback

First published February 28, 2000

Reviews

[Ryan · Rating 2 out of 5]

How Typography Happens is a short study of the emergence of the typographer as an explicit profession between 1900 and 1940. The book covers the US and Britain, Germany, and France in three separate chapters.

This book would have been much better if Ruari McClean was able to communicate this history to a more talented writer, instead of taking on the task himself. Most times, the book felt more like a dump of names, dates, an printing press companies than it did like a coherent narrative on the emergence of the typographer as a profession.

McClean even includes many pictures of the typographers themselves, rather than illustrations of their work, which further clouds his mission. He seems to care more about the individual people and places than he does about the new profession those people crafted together.

Only in a few isolated moments did the writing really shine and help me understand how this profession developed. It's an interesting enough topic, but not one very well described in this book.