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Abecedaries

I’ve had the beginnings of a post milling about in my head for ages now - it was to be a grand discussion of the role of constraint in design, bringing in quotes from Beethoven and the great poets…. This is not that post, but it’s related.

An abecedary is an alphabet book (see dictionary.com and thesaurus.com for alternative glosses). If you’re like me, you might think that there isn’t a whole lot you could do with an alphabet book - I mean, the genre must’ve been exhausted by now, right? The alphabet’s several thousand years old, after all.

You’d be wrong. It turns out that there is some amazing work being done within the constraints of abecedary design. I was first turned on to this several months ago when I ran across Bembo’s Zoo (the letter C is my favorite). The site led me to the book by Roberto DeVicq De Cumptich, which in turn led me to David Pelletier’s The Graphic Alphabet. Both of these books show immense creativity, reimagining the standard alphabet book and its clichés (animals? how original…) and providing an impressive display of graphical prowess.

But that’s not all - through the magic of Amazon, I’ve also seen Alphabet City (by Stephen T. Johnson and Kristin Gilson) and The Z Was Zapped: A Play in 26 Acts (by Chris Van Allsburg). I’m well on my way to becoming a de facto abecedary collector. I can’t wait to have kids - to share these books with, to have an excuse for having alphabet books in the house so I don’t have to hide them when friends come over….

Oh, and just to tie this back into the constraints and design topic I mentioned at the head of the post - an abecedary is also a 26-line poem in which each line begins with the corresponding letter of the alphabet. No restrictions on rhyme or meter, though, so it’s really only a mild requirement.