It's that time of year again, when
Portland parents toss their unfortunate children into the remains of
a 1985 Chevy Nova at 7AM and risk the lives of everyone within a 50
mile radius to be able to skid around the curves of drive thru lanes
up and down Meridian Street.
Oddly enough, despite my track record
of complaining about this every year as though it will change
anything, I am not here to discuss the importance of not slamming
into a school bus at 500 miles per hour in a beaten up Oldsmobile
Bravada with a car full of illegitimate children in a freak snow
storm.
I am here to announce some things about
my writing. I can hear all your boners sprouting. Writing is such an
exciting topic for non-writers, I know. Bear with me, because I
promise this will be worth reading.
I have news. Since Antioch is finished
now, save for editing, I have begun trying to decide on a typeface to
use, as it currently rests in whatever the default is on whatever
computer I happen to use (I have 4, because I am an asshole).
Now before you all crucify me for
perceived future mistakes, I will let you know that Helvetica is one
of my top choices, but in order to use it I will have to pay Adobe
$30. Of course, this is not a bad price compared to another font I
was looking at until I saw the price tag: $500 for a set of 4 font
sets.
Oh, no. Now that I've revealed that I
plan to pay for the ability to use a font that is literally
everywhere, I expect to hear things like “Why don't you torrent
it?” Or even better, from Mac owners: “My computer comes with it.
Doesn't yours?” I suppose I could use someone's mac to put Antioch
into PDF format, yes. I suppose I could also torrent it. First of
all, though, I want to own the right to use whatever font I choose
for whatever purpose I see fit without the possibility of legal
action being smashed up my ass. Also, alternatives to Helvetica are
either also paid (Nimbus Sans, $20), or so rough on screen that they
aren't totally viable (Helios). Secondly, free versions of Helvetica
are often some other font, lacking that clever little retro capital R
that everyone adores.
That being said, I have also considered
that clever Helvetica imposter known as Arial.
I said it, and I have no regrets.
ARIAL, you bitches. ARIAL.
Hark, I hear the small sounds of
protest beginning.
Do you hear that? It's the sound of
lensless glasses melting in the heat of self-important rage. It's the
sound of a billion cans of Pabst Blue Ribbon upending from the force
of the anger and chaos I just unleashed by saying that hated font's
name. Starbucks and Joanne's just burst into ironic flames. Suddenly,
Goodwill stores across the nation are flooded with acid wash jeans!
ARIAL UNICODE, I SAY! MICROSOFT SANS
SERIF, EVEN! THAT VILE IMPOSTER, WITH IT'S HELVETICA “G” BUT
ARIAL “R”!
Somewhere, a Toyota Prius is weeping.
Somewhere, IKEA and Whole Foods have been converted to Wal-mart and
Save-A-Lot. Somewhere, the only place one can get iced coffee is a
McDonald's filled with screaming demon children. It's a horrible
place where “Mocha” and “latte” are never the same drink, and
“large” is a real size.
Oh, the humanity!
We'll all be overrun by the bad parts
of the 1980s and 1990s. Full House and Matlock will be on every
channel, and we'll all wake up to find that we've been sporting
mullets for years.
All because I used Arial.
A bit dramatic, sure, but that's the
culture we live in.
I may do it just to watch the world
destroy itself, humanity withering to little more than nomadic tribes
warring and murdering over the last MacBook on Earth, scrambling for
black rimmed glasses and hording typewriters in the corners of ruined
hotel rooms.
We all think we're writers, don't we? I
certainly think I am.
The truth is, the more people flip out
about what font a writer publishes in, the more ridiculous the whole
affair becomes. I mean, there are some obvious no-nos. Publishing a
research paper in Comic Sans, for instance. Using Brush Script for a
road sign.
I have seen some silly slanderfests
over the use of Arial as opposed to Helvetica. While the more
educated of us may consider Arialists to be “amateurish” and
“careless” in their font choices, I ask them to bear this in
mind: the font is secondary to the story, providing it isn't
something distracting and annoying. Arial is only distracting to
people who buy their food at Whole Foods and their clothes at
Goodwill. The general public will not know the difference.
Granted, I may end up choosing
Helvetica because it is one of the most readable fonts, and can be
easily used for large print text because of this, but Arial is
equally suited for this, and it's technically free. No licenses to
buy in order to use Arial.
One can fuss about fonts used, or one
can write a story that transcends fonts. Some people can do both, but
most people just criticize other people's font choices.
I suppose that's the condition of my
generation, and the next generation that is starting to emerge in our
shit-filled wake: that form is much more important that function.
It's evident in the sheer number of horrifically written fiction
being sold, even by big publishing houses. (Our generation is also
the one that made using an apostrophe and an “s” to make
something plural the norm, which throws me into a similar homocidal
PBR rage every time I see it on a billboard or on TV. Bad grammar is
bad grammar, no matter how accepted it is.)
Fellow indie authors, we need to put
down our god damned messenger bags and write something that can
dispell this image, because I'm afraid that I'm decades away from
writing anything life-altering. I have readers, sure, and I've
actually enjoyed a lot of success when compared to the lame, weak
amount of marketing I've actually done, but some of us are just
dellusional, writing bullshit that no one will ever relate to or be
moved by just so we can slam it into a respectable font.
We are the generation of pretty fonts,
and they aren't even ours. Our parents and grandparents made them.
We've made some interesting mutations, but we've neglected to do the
one thing that previous generations DID do, which is to write
something groundbreaking. We need to write something that will be
anthologized for decades after our death.
The font should be just as transparent
as the writing style. Readers don't ordinarily pick up a book to
admire the font or be awed by a clever passage or two, they want
substance. They want to be entertained and educated.
This isn't necessarily a dig at
typographers, because typography is the foundation of writing.
Typographic art also happens to be my favorite kind of art, and I
plan to have a house filled with it one day. I am targeting the
hordes of unmotivated, overeducated fools who think that making a
pretty font based on Helvetica makes one a writer.
The definition of writer is clearly
different depending on the person. I think we've lost sight of what
the focus ought to be if you call yourself a writer. The focus, as I
see it, is expression first. Second, to make reading the norm again,
and to make it accessible to everyone. The focus next is to trim the
fat. Make every word do something. Nothing turns modern readers off
more than 7 pages of no action. I suppose this can be attributed to
the culture of TV saturation, but that's all the more reason to press
on and adapt. Great art can be created with words, if you only get
the dildo of pretense out of your ass. Slapping a bullshit book into
a cool font does not make it a better book. It makes it a décor
piece. It makes it a bookshelf filler. Typefaces, as they apply to
fiction, are wallpaper. Wallpapering a poorly designed house does not
make it a better house.
Be it by the label of typographer,
writer, painter, mixed media, architect or anything else relating to
art, there is nothing more offensive than someone who goes by the
title of “artist” but produces no art, they merely criticize the
art of others. I'm not saying that non-artists aren't welcome critics
and a resource of valuable feedback, but to pretend to be one of us
just so your blows will hit harder is social suicide, and if and when
the current hipster culture is replaced by whatever is next, you will
be obsolete.
So, when the world ends because I put a
piece of writing into Arial or Helvetica, don't be sad. I will have
created something that will outlive me in one form or another. That's
what actually matters.
