Eric A. Havelock, Jackson P. Hershbell (eds.): Communication Arts in the Ancient World (1978)
Filed under book | Tags: · alphabet, antiquity, communication, literacy, media, media history, oral culture, orality, poetry
A collection of ancient studies “devoted to exploring the beginnings of literacy in ancient Greece and Rome, and the effects of writing on these cultures.”
Publisher Hastings House, New York, 1978
ISBN 0803812523, 9780803812529
xiv+162 pages
Review: H. Curtis Wright (Journal of Library History, 1980).
PDF (19 MB)
Comment (0)Johanna Drucker: Alphabetic Labyrinth: The Letters in History and Imagination (1995–) [EN, SR]
Filed under book | Tags: · alphabet, book, graphic design, text, typography
“The alphabet is at once familiar and mysterious. Its letters have been the object of speculation since their invention almost four thousand years ago; the symbols represent sounds, yet they exist in their own right, often invested with quasi-magical power. Johanna Drucker, who teaches art history at Yale University, examines the imaginative and idiosyncratic ways in which the letters of the alphabet have been assigned value in political, spiritual, or religious belief systems over two millennia. The first book to explore fully this colorful, poetic, and frequently eccentric realm, The Alphabetic Labyrinth is richly complemented by images that have rarely or never before been reproduced. Drawing on a wide variety of little-known sources, both literary and artistic, the author adds a new and exciting chapter to the history of ideas which will prove fascinating to cultural historians, art historians, and anyone interested in the history of writing.”
Publisher Thames and Hudson, London, 1995
ISBN 0500016089, 9780500016084
315 pages
Reviews: Ellen Lupton (Eye, 1995), Cliff Pickover (Leonardo, 1999).
The Alphabetic Labyrinth (English, 1995, 18 MB)
Alfabetski lavirint (Serbian, trans. Branislav Kovačević, 2006)
Iakov Chernikhov: Postroyenie shriftov (1958) [Russian]
Filed under book | Tags: · alphabet, graphic design, typography, writing
A book on the history of Russian and Latin typography from the avant-garde architect Iakov Chernikhov.
Построение шрифтов [Constructing Fonts]
With N.A. Sobolev (Н.А. Соболев)
Published in Moscow, 1958
Reprinted by Architektura-S, Moscow, 2007
ISBN 5964700330
116 pages
via Arch-grafika.ru
PDF (68 MB, updated on 2015-11-10)
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