Body-text fonts, pt. 38: Pilgrim

R.I.P. the Pope.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

This month’s typeface, the designing of which was begun but not completed by Eric Gill, is one of my favorites. Like Ehrhardt and Plantin, it was a common British choice for typesetting paperbacks during the ’fifties, ’sixties, ’seventies, and ’eighties.

Good times!

Then Pilgrim fell into disuse because of the eclipse of metal type. Its decline made it apt for fancy “retro” productions.

It used to grace the cheap stuff. I assume that its name was meant to evoke the oft-reprinted Pilgrim’s Progress.

Incidentally, if you want to know what fonts are especially good at small sizes on cheap paper, compare reprints of The Lord of the Rings. (Don’t look at bibles; too many are incompetently produced.)

I wish Pilgrim would come back into vogue.

A good digital interpretation is Canada Type’s Bunyan Pro. See this PDF for samples, including a short essay on the suitability of Gill’s fonts for body text.

Body-text fonts, pt. 36: Gill Sans

A sans-serif typeface – rare in this series.

Designed by the wicked Eric Gill. Practically synonymous with Britain.

I don’t care for the regular weight, actually, but the lighter weight is very nice in certain settings, e.g. in this remarkable Lego-builders’ book that Samuel borrowed from the library. (I refer to the body text, not the heading.)

I made the caption easier to read:

(Echoes of Ian Fleming’s prose.)

Gill Sans Nova is a nice compromise, weight-wise.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

Ada and George, my little niece and nephew, visited today. They were eager to see their cousins but couldn’t keep their names straight.

Ada drew this card-brandishing soccer referee. Notice the microphone wrapped around his or her cheek.

Body-text fonts, pt. 15: Golden Cockerel

A chicken loitered in neighbors’ front yards this weekend. Then it crossed the road, got into our back yard, and stayed for two days.

Karin posted a notice to an online bulletin board. “No one will claim that bird,” one of her colleagues told her. “It’s a gamecock.”

Karin called the Dept. of Animal Control. She gave our address. The van drove down our street. It didn’t stop. Karin called again. The van came back. This time, it stopped in front of our house.

I went outside. “Are you here for the chicken?” I said.

“No,” said the officer, “I just thought I’d visit.”

Crickets.

“Sorry,” she said. “Yes, I’m here for the chicken.”

We went out back and cornered the chicken. The officer caught it with a net and put it into a pet carrier. “Its wings have been clipped,” she said.

♦ ♦ ♦ ♦ ♦

In honor of this chicken, my typeface of the month is Golden Cockerel, digitized by ITC and originally designed by the brilliant but evil (and ubiquitous) Eric Gill. I don’t think I have any books that use Golden Cockerel for body text rather than display text. It’d have to be a “precious” book indeed. Like this one, or this one:

I take it back: Text Publishing, the Australian company, sets some unglamorous books in Golden Cockerel.

Other typefaces by Gill will be acknowledged in due course.