"The first has to do with the direction of reading. I believe the second is, like many things in typography, customary; there’s nothing inherently better than right-leaning letters, except we’re used to them since those are the only ones we ever see."
Not at all. It is simply because the tip of a quill and the nib of a traditional[1] fountain pen cannot move in any direction. The way you hold it if you are right handed forbids moving in the "backslash"* direction[2] upwards. You can "draw" from top down but not "shove" upwards in that direction. Since in joined script we start letters mostly from the baseline (and have connecting strokes) this makes the "right leaning slant" much easier to write.
The anatomy of a right handed writer also plays a role. When you write fast, the hand pivots at the wrist and fingers as it moves rightward, and that produces a forward slant.
[1] Modern fountain pen nibs have a little ball at tip. So even if you used on in primary school you might not have noticed the directional effect.
[2] That is why the slash (virgula) has existed for centuries while the backslash is an invention of the computer age.
I’m a simple man. I see a post from Marcin about typography or keyboards and I upvote. He has such a passion for this and I’ve always loved his storytelling.
I thought maybe to account for the origin of italics, it could be that it's easier to slant in that direction while writing left-to-right than the other way.
However, when people write Yiddish (which has a right-to-left script) they slant the same way[^1], whereas you'd expect the opposite if it were easier, so maybe it is just arbitrary.
"The first has to do with the direction of reading. I believe the second is, like many things in typography, customary; there’s nothing inherently better than right-leaning letters, except we’re used to them since those are the only ones we ever see."
Not at all. It is simply because the tip of a quill and the nib of a traditional[1] fountain pen cannot move in any direction. The way you hold it if you are right handed forbids moving in the "backslash"* direction[2] upwards. You can "draw" from top down but not "shove" upwards in that direction. Since in joined script we start letters mostly from the baseline (and have connecting strokes) this makes the "right leaning slant" much easier to write.
The anatomy of a right handed writer also plays a role. When you write fast, the hand pivots at the wrist and fingers as it moves rightward, and that produces a forward slant.
[1] Modern fountain pen nibs have a little ball at tip. So even if you used on in primary school you might not have noticed the directional effect.
[2] That is why the slash (virgula) has existed for centuries while the backslash is an invention of the computer age.
I'm surprised no left handed writer before the computer age tried to do a forward slash, found it doesn't work, and said "fuck it" and did a backslash
Marcin's attention to details, showcasing works that demonstrate the craftsmanship in what is typically considered mundane, is really amazing!
Yes, please continue to the Lord's work. Reading this site is always a pleasure.
I’m a simple man. I see a post from Marcin about typography or keyboards and I upvote. He has such a passion for this and I’ve always loved his storytelling.
So pleasant to see elegance in such seemingly mundane places. Someone cared and took a little extra time. Bravo to them!
What a lovely example to end on.
Personally, I (guiltily) love using ol'fashioned contractions. I wish it were more normalised.
I thought maybe to account for the origin of italics, it could be that it's easier to slant in that direction while writing left-to-right than the other way.
However, when people write Yiddish (which has a right-to-left script) they slant the same way[^1], whereas you'd expect the opposite if it were easier, so maybe it is just arbitrary.
[^1]: An example of Yiddish handwriting https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yiddish_orthography#/media/Fil...
Lovely photographs as well, great composition and the bold editing.
Interesting. I don't see any evidence that the stadium is 4 characters though.
Woah, I've never seen a 24x2 HD44780 before! Only 16x2 and 20x4.
I went to see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronovisor_(film) recently. If ever there were a film for typography nerds!