Printed words. Why are they important? Why make any distinction at all between print and written-script? Sure, you have to know how you are going to produce a piece of writing, which method you will use to set mark to page. But certainly that should be the end of it, right? Print it with letters, any discernible font will do, on paper with whatever means necessary I don't care if you stamp, type, emboss or print, just get those words on the page!

This might have been my view a few years ago, before I took a class in book-making. I just had no idea. However I quickly learned how significant the artistry of mark-making is once I heard the rhythmic sounds of a hand operated printing press: crink, womp, and shooh–the roller coming down, ink pressed to letters, letters pressed to page and then out. No matter if you are a writer, publisher or simply a human with a heartbeat, you'll feel the weight of the printed word's significance once you hear that sound.

The moment in A Short History of the Printed Word that brought me back to those moments in the print-room was when Bringhurst closed Chapter I by outlining the debate between scholars regarding the significance of print mechanics. Although, in most things I tend to side with the Romantics in their ideology in this one I side with William Blake when he said "mechanical excellence is the only vehicle of genius." He seems to say, know your tool, know it well and you can be masterful with it. This idea continues to resonate even in todays electro-technically dependent culture. Know your tool, be it computer, pen or printing press and you have the means to produce compelling streams of thought through thoughtfully arranged words.