Dutch Type by Jan Middendorp

[ktinkel]

Dutch Type (http://www.dutchtype.org/dtintro.html) is a beautifully printed, well-bound, large-format, very expensive book ($92.50 U.S. at Amazon). Although I have not finished reading every word, I am prepared to say that this is an important book and — even though it follows that nasty practice of failing to indent paragraphs — worth every penny.

Jan Middendorp’s text opens with a brief history of early type design and printing in the Low Countries, settling the Coster myth very nicely, discussing early pioneer S.H. de Roos, the art deco new typography periods, and then (by page 50), begins to get down to the important Dutch type designers.

There are a lot of them, including Dick Dooijes, Sem Hartz, Wim Crouwel, Chris Brand, Gerrit Noordzij, Bram de Does, Gerard Unger, Rudy Vandeerlans, Petr van Blokland, Albert-Jan Pool, Jelle Bosma, Frank E. Blokland, Peter Matthias Noordzij, Luc(as) de Groot, Peter Verheul, Evert Bloemsma, Fred Smeijers, Martin Majoor, Peter Bil’ak, and more. I just grabbed a few names from the contents page — there are many more designers whose work is described and shown in this book of 320 (roughly 8.5 X 11-inch) pages.

Many of the chapters include not only examples of the designer’s commercial fonts but student work and drawings, helping to show the evolution of the design. This is not just a pretty book designed to help type designers sell more fonts — it has a great deal of information about the people and the work. There is an index of names and another of type designs; and there is a large bibliography.

Dutch Type is well set (except for the missing paragraph indents :() in OurType Versa by Peter Verheul with OurType Fresco Sans by Fred Smeijers on the cover.

This book fills in many blanks in the rapidly growing list of typefaces designed since 1990 (or so). You may be surprised to see how many new faces are from the Dutch.

It would be fabulous if similar books could be written for the rest of living type designers producing an enduring record of all this activity. We could only hope that those books might be as well-done and useful as Middendorp’s.

[iamback]

Dutch Type is well set (except for the missing paragraph indents :() in OurType Versa by Peter Verheul with OurType Fresco Sans by Fred Smeijers on the cover.In a Dutch book about Dutch type no paragraph indents would not be unexpected! :)

[ktinkel]

In a Dutch book about Dutch type no paragraph indents would not be unexpected! :)Doesn’t make it right!

You are an expert on web accessibility; I am at least a minor expert on readability in general. Even Jan Tschichold — who was the foremost exponent of abandoning the frivolity of indented paragraphs — came around quickly to understanding their utility in terms of readability.

Of course, those who think type (or text) is just another form of ornament will disagree, but to the rest of us, the one-em indent for every paragraph exept the first (or one that follows a subhead) is an essential component of readable text.

[iamback]

Doesn’t make it right!It is here though! It's a common layout style used here - and not only in the Netherlands but as far as I know in other European countries as well.

You are an expert on web accessibility; I am at least a minor expert on readability in general. Even Jan Tschichold — who was the foremost exponent of abandoning the frivolity of indented paragraphs — came around quickly to understanding their utility in terms of readability.Maybe. To my eyes, indenting paragraphs is (still) just ugly. Usability of text actually has a lot to do with what you are accustomed to in how things are laid out. I never had any problems reading whole books laid out with unindented paragraphs. Both styles are used here, but unindented paragraphs are very common. When I started to read more English books, indented paragraphs started to look somewhat less unusual, but still ugly (remember: I'm a stickler for lining things up! And not just because I learned about that in typography classes. Indented paragraphs are a little jarring that way) - maybe even a little less ugly, but for me there really is no difference in usability.

Possibly even the other way round (especially on the web) because of the slightly jarring effect of indented paragraphs. I just recently saw a (Dutch) web site done that way - it actually made me stop reading: the text no longer "flows" for me.

Of course, those who think type (or text) is just another form of ornament will disagree, but to the rest of us, the one-em indent for every paragraph exept the first (or one that follows a subhead) is an essential component of readable text.The rest of you - only if you started to read with text laid out that way. :) But it's not "ornament" - it is a different layout style that you are are either used to or you are not. When you start to read German (as a foreign language), the many capitals for nouns can have the same jarring effect; as you read more, you become accustomed to it and they even help. The very different quoting style used in French texts is the same again. And so on...

So all this is not only style differences - it's cultural differences in laying out text. Readable is what you are used to. Your sense for esthetics depends on that as well.

[ktinkel]

Readable is what you are used to. Your sense for esthetics depends on that as well.In part, of course. And some of it is hard-wired, having to do with eyes. All affected by reading conditions as well.

The paragraph indent is still debated among typophiles, but you will not find much educated opinion on the side of omitting it. Even Jan Tschichold, who promoted the unindented paragraph as a key reformer in the Bauhaus-influenced Germany of the 1920s and 30s changed his mind as an adult, and argued strenuously for indents when he was in England. This was expressed in his style manual for composition for Penguin Books. Tschichold was one of the most influential typographers of the 20th century, and was a thoughtful and persuasive writer! I will see if I can dig up some of his arguments on this.

The practical problem of paragraphs without indention is that the reader must depend on the length of one paragraph as a signal of a break for the next one. It is just luck whether the last line will be short enough to serve as a clue. And of course there will be last lines of various widths. All of this serves to make extra work for the reader’s eye and brain, even though it may not be noticed consciously.

It is also a semantic issue. If paragraphs make no difference — if they do not indicate a slight change of topic, say — then not indenting might make sense. It wouldn’t matter if the reader got a warning about the new paragraph. But if there is meaning to the paragraph — and I believe there certainly ought to be — then the reader deserves a hint that the focus is shifting.

Paragraph indents are ancient — they replaced the habit of placing the ¶ (pilcrow or paragraph mark) at the start of each paragraph by leaving the space empty.

All that said, of course it is partly a cultural thing, most common among the Dutch and Germans, not among the English, French, and others. I wonder when it began — after 1925, or before.

[iamback]

All that said, of course it is partly a cultural thing, most common among the Dutch and Germans, not among the English, French, and others. I wonder when it began — after 1925, or before.I may be wrong, but I associate it with Bauhaus influence - a strong influence in the Netherlands, too. I wouldn't be surprised to find it in Austria, too.

And guess what? That Rembrandt's Amsterdam walking tour booklet uses Futura and unindented paragraphs - I had to check, but it was exactly as I expected. :) (And I did say I found it a pleasure to use - if I had had any trouble reading it I wouldn't have said that, would I?)

More in general, I'd expect it sooner with a sans-serif font than with a serif one. Must be my Bauhaus indoctrination. :p (We were fed a lot of Bauhaus at the Academy of Arts in Arnhem - which appealed to me strongly.)

I was sure some magazines I'm reading use this style, too - I did find one Dutch computer mag that uses both styles (depending on article type); and everything is set in sans-serif in this mag. The official neighborhood magazine (published by the neighborhood council) also uses sans-serif only and unindented paragraphs. Yet another Dutch magazine uses mostly a serif font for body text, with heavily-indented paragraphs (much more than on em), which for some reason I find less jarring than the one-em indent; but in soem items, for instance a side bar, or a double-page illustration with superimposd text, they use a sans-serif font - and unindented paragraphs (even on right-aligned text on the illustration!). (It looks like they use sans-serif for all text superimposed on illustrations - which makes sense to me.)

Sometimes unindented paragraphs are separated with a little extra whitespace (not as much as a whole line height, which many browsers seem to default to), but I've yet to find an example of that. But I didn't spend a lot of time searching (and don't intend to) - the examples I have were very easily found!

[iamback]

Oh, and textbooks... I have many IT-related textbooks, and only a small minority of them in Dutch. I just looked at a few, and found that practically all of them use unindented paragraphs (I found only one that didn't) and most of them separate paragraphs with whitespace. All I've checked so far use a serif font for body text though; one of them had a little blurb on the back cover in a serif font - with unindented paragraphs not separated with whitespace.

[ktinkel]

. . . and most of them separate paragraphs with whitespace. That is office style, and if you see it in books, odds are they were typeset by the author, not a typographer.

That, like deep paragraph indents, disrupts the flow of the text. And it makes the page look choppy instead of evenly textured.

[Michael Rowley]

Marjolein:

In a Dutch book about Dutch type no paragraph indents would not be unexpected!

I didn't know that about Dutch typographical practice, but it's not uncommon in German practice. It can be difficult for the reader though if a last line of a preceding paragraph is nearly full, and it doesn't go well with Flattersatz.

[Michael Rowley]

KT:

Even Jan Tschichold . . . argued strenuously for indents when he was in England.

And after that: he even was for the indent and against increased inter-line spacing beween paragraphs on the ground that it interfered with the flow much more than a l.h. indent did.

[iamback]

That is office style, and if you see it in books, odds are they were typeset by the author, not a typographer.I'll bet that textbooks that were translated from English (Samsom, Academic Press et al.) - most of my Dutch textbooks are in fact translated - were not set by the author though.

That, like deep paragraph indents, disrupts the flow of the text. And it makes the page look choppy instead of evenly textured.Deep paragraph indents mostly work better for me than the 1 em ones - with one exception: if the last line of the previous paragraph is shorter than the indent is wide.

Looking at those textbooks, if find the "choppyness" of white-separated paragraphs actually useful. They're "knowledge bites" and it's much easier to find them back, too. For a novel it wouldn't work - and in fact I see mostly indented paragraphs (and no vertical whitespace) in novels.

[iamback]

I didn't know that about Dutch typographical practice, but it's not uncommon in German practice. It can be difficult for the reader though if a last line of a preceding paragraph is nearly full, and it doesn't go well with Flattersatz.Yes, long last lines can be problematic with unindented paragraphs, as can very short last lines with deeply indented paragraphs. I don't know the term Flattersatz - what does that mean? Fully-justified?

[Michael Rowley]

Marjolein:

I don't know the term Flattersatz

It's German, of course, but I don't know what it's called in the Netherlands and don't like what it's called by the Americans ('ragged right'), because it should gently flutter, like a flag but not a storm-torn one: much propagated by Tschichold.

I've often met unindented paragraphs in German texts I've had to translate, and frequently it was difficult to sort out where a new paragraph started. Since each paragraph should represent an idea, that can cause confusion.

[donmcc]

Is there no indication of paragraphing (other than the short last line?).

I agree with KT that some sort of signal to a new paragraph is required: either an indent or a space between paragraphs. Tech-doc has made a one line space standard, but I find that as little as a quarter line will do the trick.

I would be greatly confused by columns of text that do not have one or the other of the two methods of signalling a new paragraph.

[iamback]

Is there no indication of paragraphing (other than the short last line?).

I agree with KT that some sort of signal to a new paragraph is required: either an indent or a space between paragraphs. Tech-doc has made a one line space standard, but I find that as little as a quarter line will do the trick.

I would be greatly confused by columns of text that do not have one or the other of the two methods of signalling a new paragraph.You would be - I'm not! It's really a matter of what you're used to, and my readily found examples illustrate how much printed matter with unindented paragraphs I come across. I don't have any trouble with any of the examples I found. I wasn't even aware of where the unindented paragraphs occur until I started looking for them as a result of this thread!

Thinking about it, the primary clue simply is a capital at the start of a line; the chance of that happening mid-paragraph is fairly small - at least in Dutch. That being the case, unindented paragraphs would be a lot harder to read in German than in Dutch! Even English tends to use more capitals than Dutch does (things like names of months and weekdays are all lowercase in Dutch, for instance). The major spanner in the works would be proper names; if you have a lot of those (depends on the subject matter) the chance of a captal at the start of a line increases sharply.

But a new paragraph does't start mid-sentence, so actually the major clue is a full stop followed by a capital at the start of the line. The eyes always scan a bit ahead of what you're actually taking in, so that's not too hard - unless you have specific types of vision problems that limit this scanning ahead.

What I'm trying to explain is that as you learn to read, you develop certain scanning patterns and ways of discerning clues for textual structure: you develop different patterns when all you see is indented paragraphs than when when a lot of what you see is unindented paragraphs as well. Different habits, different clues.

[ktinkel]

Flattersatz . . . don't like what it's called by the Americans ('ragged right'), because it should gently flutter, like a flag but not a storm-torn one: much propagated by Tschichold.Your flattersatz is closer to our “soft rag.” The term “rag right” simply means that the text is set that way, and nothing at all about the quality of the rag.

A soft rag always calls for some manual labor — you must either create (or eliminate) some hyphenation or cheat by adjusting word spacing to make the line endings form a graceful pattern. Not every typographer (or budget) allows for it.

But rag right is a setting — not centered, not justified, not rag left.

[Michael Rowley]

KT:

But rag right is a setting — not centered, not justified, not rag left

Was that setting ever used before Tschichold et al. propagated the use of Flattersatz? I didn't think it was, but we in Britain are a bit slow in spotting 'revolutionary' trends in typography.