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Typography

The Rivers Nobody Measured

·6 min in full, in the book·PagePerfect Journal

Justify a narrow column in a word processor, leave hyphenation off, and the word spaces on one line come out visibly wider than on the next. Stack a few of the wide ones and the gaps fall into pale channels running down the paragraph. Those channels have a reputation as a severe physiological impediment to reading, and the reputation is the part that did not survive the checking.

The rest of this essay is in the book

It goes on to cover:

  • What justification actually moves
  • What the experiments measured
  • The return sweep will not carry it
  • Which tools can hyphenate
  • Looking at the whole paragraph
  • What this book’s engine cannot do
  • What is left of the case against justification

About the book

Further reading