Shakspere & Typography

    2 Henry IV, i, 1.
Evidently Shakspere had a good idea of what a Title-page should contain.

From Title to Preface is but a turn of the leaf, and its introductory character is thus noticed:

Is but a Preface of her worthy praise,
The chief perfections of that lovely dame.

    1 Henry VI, v, 5.
We must not forget a well-known passage about the introduction of Printing to England, which has caused much discussion. It is where Jack Cade accuses Lord Saye:

Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm in erecting a grammar-school: and whereas, before, our forefathers had no other books but the score and the tally, thou hast caused printing to be used; and, contrary to the king, his crown, and dignity, thou hast built a paper mill.

    2 Henry VI, iv, 7.

The early-invented fable of Faustus, and the assistance given him by the Devil in the multiplication of the first printed bibles (certainly a most short-sighted step on the part of his Satanic Majesty) had got fixed in the minds of the populace, and created among the ignorant a prejudice against the Printing-press, and it was to this feeling Jack Cade appealed. All our Chroniclers place the erection of a Printing-press in England some years too early, but no one except Shakspere has put the date so far back as 1450, the date of Jack Cade’s insurrection: it is simply a blunder; but it was the Printing-press and its introduction to this country that was in the Author’s brain, and the exact date of that event was unknown, being probably as difficult to arrive at then as it is now.[1 - The exact date was probably as difficult to arrive at then as now. The arrival of William Caxton in England may, with a certainty of being near the truth, be placed in 1475-6, the date 1474 given by most writers being a misconception of the language used by Caxton in the Preface to the Chess-book. The Art on its first introduction was looked upon suspiciously by the people, few of whom could read, its chief patrons being a few of the more educated among the nobles and the rich burghers of London. Another mistake is to suppose that Caxton printed in Westminster Abbey. His printing-office was a tenement to the south-east of the Abbey Church; its sign was the ‘Red-pale’, and Caxton rented it of the Abbot. There is evidence to show that Caxton and the Abbot were on distant terms of amity – none to show that the Ecclesiastic encouraged or patronised the Printer, notwithstanding Dean Stanley’s assertions in a sermon lately preached by him in Westminster Abbey. The only occasion upon which Caxton mentions the Abbot is to this effect – that the Abbot, not being able himself to read a passage in old MS., sent it to Caxton, with a request that he would translate it. (See The Life and Typography of William Caxton, by William Blades. 2 vols., 4to. London, 1861-63.)]

We have already noticed in how simple a manner originated that grand discovery which, instead of one perishable manuscript, produced numberless printed books, and thus enabled mankind to perpetuate for ever the knowledge they had gained. The real superiority of the Press over the pen was the easy multiplication of copies, and this was the idea in the Poet’s brain when he wrote:

She carved thee for her seal and meant thereby
Thou shouldst print more nor let that copy die.

    Sonnet xi.
Type-founding has in these days arrived at such perfection, that most of the blemishes and faults common in Shakspere’s time are now unknown. Under the old system of hand moulds a type founder was sure when commencing work to cast a certain number of imperfect letters, because until the mould by use got warmed, the liquid metal solidified too soon, and the body or shank of the type was shrunk, and became no inappropriate emblem of an old man’s limbs whose hose would be

A world too wide for his shrunk shank.

    As You Like It, ii, 7.
The names of the various sizes of type in the sixteenth century were few compared with our modern list; Canon, Great Primer, Pica, Long Primer, and Brevier almost complete the catalogue; and however familiar Shakspere may have been with their names, it is difficult to imagine any scene in which these technical names could be introduced with propriety. Yet, of one, Nonpareil, a new small type first introduced from Holland about 1650, and which for its beauty and excellence was much admired, Shakspere seems to have conceived a most favorable idea. Prospero, praising his daughter, calls her ‘a Nonpareil’ (Tempest, Act iii, Sc. 2); Olivia is the ‘Nonpareil of beauty’ (Twelfth Night, Act i, Scene 5); and Posthumus speaks of Imogen as the ‘Nonpareil of her time’ (Cymbeline, Act ii, Scene 5).

The exactitude and precision of everything connected with the arrangement of printing from types is curiously hinted at by Touchstone, when describing the preciseness of the Courtiers’ quarrels:

We quarrel in print by the book.

    As You Like It, v, 4;
that is, no step was taken except according to acknowledged rules.

It often happens when a book comes to its last sheet that the text runs short, and two or three blank or vacant pages remain at the end. In the middle of one of these it is usual to place the typographer’s imprint. What compositor is there who has rejoiced in such fat pages[2 - Fat Pages. ‘Fat’ as a conventional word is not confined to Printers. ‘A fat living’ is a phrase not unknown among churchmen, and is used in the same sense by the compositor, who charges the master-printer for the fat pages, in which no work appears, at the same rate as if they were full.] but will not at once recognise the following allusion:

The vacant leaves thy mind’s imprint will bear,
And of this book this learning mayst thou taste.

    Sonnet lxxvii.
People with a grievance write now-a-days to the Newspapers, in hope of redress. In Shakspere’s time the only method to make wrongs public and to show up abuses was by the Broadside, in prose or rhyme, passing from hand to hand. Many of these have survived to the present day, and are treasured up as curious relics of a by-gone age. They were frequently libellous and grievously personal, and hence the point of Pistol’s remark:

Fear we broadsides?

    2 Henry IV, ii, 4.
We must not think here that the naval ‘broadside’ – a volley of guns from the broadside of a ship – is meant. Shakspere does not use the word once in that sense, nor was it a conversational word in his time. That Pistol was indeed thinking of a printed broad sheet is evident from the whole sentence, which, although composed of disjointed exclamations continues with the following expressions, both strongly suggestive of the Composing room or Reader’s closet:

Come we to full points here? and are etceteras nothing?

    2 Henry IV, ii, 4.
‘Come we to full points here?’ This question is often a puzzler for both Compositor and Reader. Indeed, few things cause more disagreements between Author and Printer than the very loose ideas held by the former concerning punctuation. Some writers, like Dickens in his early days, insist upon ornamenting their sentences with little dashes and big dashes, with colons where commas should be, and with

Points that seem impossible.

    Pericles, v, 1.
In vain does the Printer declare that in altering the Author’s unregulated punctuation, the irate Author exclaims, that he and adds, ‘Follow

No levelled malice infests one comma,

    Timon, i, 1,
Puts the period often from his place,

    Lucrece, l. 565,
My point and period … ill or well.

    Lear, iv, 7.
You find not the apostrophes, and so miss the accent.

    Love’s Labour Lost, iv, 2.
Wherefore stand you on nice points?

    3 Henry VI, iv, 7.
The Printer has no resource but compliance, which, however, unless the affront be very severe, will soon and thus heal the breach, and end all happily with mutual

Stand a comma ’tween their amities,

    Hamlet, v, 2,
Notes of Admiration.

    Winter’s Tale, v, 2.
‘And are etceteras nothing?’ What a typographical question! and probably the only occasion on which so unpoetical a figure has done duty in any drama. The &c. makes an insignificant appearance in either MS. or type, and yet how often it stands for whole pages of matter. Hence the point of the question.

If a book is folio, and two pages of type have been composed, they are placed in proper position upon the imposing stone, and enclosed within an iron or steel frame called a ‘chase’, small wedges of hard wood termed ‘coigns’ or ‘quoins’ being driven in at opposite sides to make all tight.

By the four opposing coigns,
Which the world together joins.

    Pericles, iii, 1.
This is just the description of a forme in folio where two quoins on one side are always opposite to two quoins on the other, thus together joining and tightening all the separate stamps. In a quaint allegorical poem, published anonymously about the year 1700, in which the mystery of man’s redemption is symbolised by the mystery of Printing, the author commences thus:

Great blest Master Printer, come
Into thy Composing-room;

and after ‘spiritualising’ the successive operations of the workman thus touches upon the quoins:

Let the Quoins be thy sure Election,