This week I saw my friend Sheelagh for the first time in a while. I've been working through some stuff and have been sort of withdrawn and anti-social although I've begun to emerge again. But my point is that she gave me a belated birthday present, and it is probably the coolest book ever. It's called The Printer's Terms, first published in 1949 by Rudolf Hostettler, Hermann Strehler, publishers in Switzerland.
Basically it has all these printing and bookbinding terms and pictures and gives translations in English, French and German! I'm such a dork, but I think it's fantastic!
I took German in high school and college and loved it - I was even a German major for a very short while and spent a few months, a few different times in Germany over a decade ago. Then nothing for ages, until last fall when I started taking lessons again and conversing with a fluent friend over lunch a couple times a month. I was so surprised how quickly much of it came back and how much I still loved the language. The major stumbling block was actually printing terms - but no more! You know, in language classes they always want you to discuss your hobbies, but letterpress terms are not exactly included in the standard lists, alongside sewing and painting and reading. My teachers and friends didn't know the words either since it isn't exactly everyday conversation, what with the rise of offset and digital.
The book is broken up into different sections such as composition, presswork, paper, and bookbinding and is full of diagrams and comparisons between the American, British, and various European ways of doing things like type high or point sizes. I'm in love!
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