Alphabets to Order: The Literature of Nineteenth-Century Typefounders' Specimens

Specimen books issued by typefounders to show their styles of type available for sale also revealed a lot about the reading habits, politics, amusements, and whimsies of the British and North American founders in the nineteenth century. Combining typographic scholarship and literary criticism, Alastair Johnston presents and discusses hundreds of examples of texts that show the founders' interests and preoccupations, from the arcane to the mundane. Co-published with The British Library.