72: Type, Lettering, & Calligraphy, 1450-1830 [T-50]
18-22 July 2005
1) How useful were the pre-course readings?
1: The pre-course readings were useful, although I didn’t need to buy most of the books (they were in my collection). 2: The pre-course readings (especially Harry Carter’s A View of Early Typography Up to About 1600 and Philip Meggs’s A History of Graphic Design) were very useful, although some of them were quite difficult to locate. 3: I knew some of the material and had read a large chunk of it, but it was a good review. 4: The readings were helpful. It was nice to get an overview. 5: They were useful to give an orientation to the course contents. 6: D.B. Updike’s Printing Types: Their History, Form, and Use and Carter were critical; other readings were helpful but not nearly as important. 7: The pre-course readings were not as necessary as in other RBS courses I’ve taken, but the class experience is much enhanced if you’ve some idea of the typographic trends and forms described in this material. 8: Quite helpful -- granted, it’s difficult to assign readings for such a class because the development of typography ranges so widely, but without some introduction, the course would have been very hard to follow.
2) Were the course syllabus and other materials distributed in class useful (or will they be so in the future, after you return home)?
1: All handouts for this course were excellent. All visuals and the amount of visuals were excellent. (Please add a timeline.) 2: Absolutely. The extensive bibliographies and illustrations that were provided for the course will continue to be of great help as I plunge further into the topic. 3: They were incredibly useful. The illustration book will be of great value when I no longer have JM’s slides/images for reference. And the bibliography is fantastic. Also quite helpful was the list of names and dates, which made note-taking simpler. 4: I will certainly take home the two course books and I expect them to be helpful at work. 5: Very useful. 6: The bibliography will be especially useful. JM’s discussion of the current state of the scholarship also allowed us to annotate some entries. 7: Yes; the course workbook and illustration book are very helpful. I should have liked a cursory chronology, though. 8: Very useful -- the workbook and bibliography were especially helpful. It might be nice (but probably impossible because of copyright problems) if we could get digital copies of the images used in class.
3) What aspects of the course content were of the greatest interest or relevance for your purposes? Was the intellectual level of the course appropriate?
1: Lectures were of most interest, especially the connection of historical influences on the type. 2: For me, gaining an overall sense of typographical history from 1450-1830 and some practice with type identification were the most relevant aspects of the course. The intellectual level was very high and invigorating. JM’s erudition is evident throughout the course. 3: The intellectual level was completely appropriate. What I most enjoyed about the content was how JM managed to tie everything together, not just the migration in types but also the various social trends which drive the letterforms. 4: Being able to identify some fonts and to put them into a historical perspective. 5: The intellectual level was very appropriate. This course covers in more depth the material introduced in the History of Typography course, which I had taken earlier, adding the relationship between the book hands, handwriting and type design. 6: The course was best when JM connected developments in type and calligraphy to contemporary national and cultural trends -- in the absence of that, it sometimes felt like we were just looking at random shapes. 7: For my purposes the general introduction the course provided was first-rate; and the intellectual level was always appropriate. 8: Seeing how widespread type styles were throughout early modern Europe has really helped me re-evaluate how I trace print history and the distribution of certain publications. I’m also much more suspicious of people who claim they can identify certain publishers or printers simply by the type!
4) If your course had field trips, were they effective?
1: Yes, we saw many helpful examples and had fruitful discussions. 2: Yes, the visit to SC was helpful. 3: We did visit SC and I found it useful. 4: Yes, definitely. It was nice to see real books that had used type we had talked about in class. 5: I enjoyed seeing the materials in SC, and it provided a break from the projected images. 6: Yes, but given that we had a small group (four students per section) and that we were all accustomed to dealing with rare materials, the insistence that we not touch the books seemed overprotective. 7: We took time to visit with Stan Nelson to learn about punchcutting; JM to cast type; and SC to look at examples of typefaces. All this was time well-spent. 8: Very much so -- we could have done even more.
5) What did you like best about the course?
1: JM and his amazing knowledge base. I consider it a real privilege to have taken a course with him. 2: The instructor’s knowledge of the subject and his sense of humor. 3: JM’s depth of knowledge but completely unassuming demeanor. 4: The most wonderful aspect of the course was listening to JM. He knows everything about type, typemaking, and printing. Also wonderful were his stories about the personalities in the typographical world. 5: JM’s knowledge of the subject is masterful and he is wonderfully articulate in conveying information about it. I appreciated hearing about current personalities and research in the field. 6: JM -- the man is a bottomless source of useful information, anecdotes, quips, &c. 7: JM is clearly an (if not the) expert in this field, but beyond this he’s really mastered the art of digital presentation. His .pdf slide shows are comprehensive and very well-produced. 8: The depth of knowledge and accessibility of the instructor.
6) How could the course have been improved?
1: It can’t. 2: It could be longer! 6: I think we might have tried to cover too much calligraphic history (especially the medieval period), forcing us to compress later type into too little time. 8: I’m not sure it could. However, it would be helpful if JM could formalize some of the strategies by which one might try to identify certain types. This is very subjective, of course, but something to help us develop our own system would be helpful.
7) We are always concerned about the physical well-being both of the RBS teaching collections and of materials owned by UVa’s Special Collections. If relevant, what suggestions do you have for the improved classroom handling of such materials used in your course this week?
2: None. 7: We really only did hands-on identification on the last day of class, and I found that the encapsulation of the materials was fully appropriate for our sight examination.
8) If you attended the Sunday and/or Monday night lectures, were they worth attending?
2: Yes, the Sunday night lecture gave me an interesting overview of the history of RBS. Monday’s lecture was interesting, but after a full day’s classes it was difficult to stay awake. 3: David Whitesell’s lecture was incredible. Very informing and entertaining. 4: Both lectures were informative. 5: Yes. 6: The Monday night lecture was very entertaining. 7: I especially enjoyed DW’s lecture, yes. 8: Absolutely, especially Monday night.
9) If you attended Museum Night, was the time profitably spent?
1: Movies of writing were dated but still quite descriptive and informative. I’d like a copy! 2: Yes. 3: Did not attend. 4: I attended the film night. Films about the alphabet, type and calligraphy were really useful. 6: Yes, although compared to years past, there seemed to be a lot less material set out.
10) Did you get your money’s worth? Any final thoughts?
1: Yes -- I enjoyed this class even more than my last one, and I would come to take JM’s follow-up when offered. P.S. Thanks for the cut-up fruit -- it’s nice to have a healthy alternative to sweets! 2: Yes. Once JM is gone, he cannot be replaced. Take the course while you can. 3: I definitely got my money’s worth. 4: Do the readings to get the background for the course. 5-6: Yes. 7: Yes, most certainly. This course is an excellent, well-thought-out and expertly produced introduction to the history of typography in European printing centers. JM is an extraordinary and kind instructor. I highly recommend the course for students interested in getting down the basics of type history in Europe during the handpress period. 8: Absolutely. I can’t imagine how or where else I’d learn this much in so short a time.
Number of respondents: 8
Percentages
Leave Tuition Housing Travel
Institution Institution Institution Institution
gave me leave paid tuition paid housing paid travel
50% 50% 38% 38%
I took vaca- I paid tui- I paid for my I paid my own
tion time tion myself own housing travel
12% 38% 62% 62%
N/A: self- N/A: Self- N/A: stayed N/A: lived
employed, re- employed, with friends nearby
tired, or had retired, or or lived at
summers off exchange home
38% 12% 0% 0%
There were three rare book librarians (40%), one archivist/manuscript librarian (12%), one general librarian with some rare book duties (12%), one teacher/professor (12%), one full-time student (12%), and one antiquarian bookseller (12%).