Can I see your Nonesuch Plantin please?

kaibernau1 Apr 2006

Tracy's Letters of credit, last page, brings up Francis Meynell's Nonesuch Plantin typeface; a short and superficial research shows it was a proprietary font for the Nonesuch press. The only book that seems to sport this exclusive little font seems to be The History of Herodotus of Halicarnassus from 1935 that fetches three-digit prices with book feti -- erm, collectors.

Does anyone happen to have this book or any other that might use Nonesuch Plantin or a reproduction of some sort? A photo of a specimen or a xerox of a page of that book? I am too curious in which way it differs from the good ole Monotype Plantin 110.

Anyone?

Thanks
Kai

George Horton1 Apr 2006#

I think it just had lengthened extenders.

hrant1 Apr 2006#

Kai, the Clark Library over here has that book*. But: it's closed until October; you can't check anything out; and they don't allow scans... But you could probably pull off some digital photography. Plannig a SoCal trip? :-)

* BTW, UCLA has that title published in 1958 and 1962; and interestingly enough the translator was Harry Carter! Dunno if those are any use to you.

BTW, didn't Monotype end up making a long-extender Plantin (too)?
I know I've seen it somewhere. Unless it was in Tracy... :-/

hhp

kaibernau2 Apr 2006#

Thanks George and Hrant.

No, unfortunately I can't make a trip to SC anytime soon, but thanks for what I must interpret as an invitation ;-)

I guess it is not so terribly important after all, especially if it was just a normal Plantin long-ex.

T,
K.

hrant2 Apr 2006#

> what I must interpret as an invitation

Sure. Just bring a sleeping bag.
For the Clark I mean - they have so
many typographic goodies, it's scary.

Actually I have a small stack of printouts of
things I need to look at at the Clark, and I'll
add this to it; when I make another trip there
I'll try to check out how "special" this Plantin is.

hhp

hrant2 Apr 2006#

I just checked, and Monotype did indeed -eventually- have
a long-extender version of Plantin. I found a sample (but
not a very good one) in Harold Berliner's compilation of
classic Monotype text faces, but I'm sure it's possible to
find a much better sample without much difficulty.

Anyway, if it matters/helps, the "long" Plantin
seems to have its extenders about 50% longer/deeper.

hhp

Captured from commoncrawl.org on 26 Apr 2015. original URL