Just My Type (1)

I have a confession. . . my guilty pleasure. I love Times New Roman.

Don’t hate me, though, please. I have reasons. Good reasons. Really.

When reading books or other long-form material, those wonderful serifs mean I don’t have to work as hard identifying words. These unconscious clues let the text go down as smoothly as yogurt (filling and full of protein).

Many other delightful, elegant, and functional serif faces are available like Bembo, Bodoni, Garamond, and Georgia. But Times New Roman stays out of my way. I don’t see it. I only see the text. I’m not distracted because it is so completely ordinary and therefore invisible.

For headlines and huge signs in public places—yes, by all means, give me Helvetica or Univers or Futura. These san serif faces are wonderful, authoritative and to the point. They get me where I want to go whether it is the exit, the entrance, or (most importantly) the men’s room.

When I first started in publishing almost fifty years ago, I knew almost nothing about typefaces until our designers started tutoring me in their nuances, their histories, their dos and don’ts.

Today, of course, we all think we are graphic designers. Since every word processing program comes complete with multiple typefaces (like Arial) and multiple fonts (like Arial Black, Arial Narrow, Arial Rounded and MT Bold). And if such a font isn’t included, we can just highlight and click bold or italic to meet our needs.

Having dozens or hundreds of options to choose from was just too much temptation for many. As an editor I often received manuscripts combining a riot of faces and fonts. What authors thought of as fancy or creative was plain distracting and ugly. Our friends at Apple and Microsoft had unleashed the untamed graphic designer in all of us.

Eventually folks caught on that simple was better. Less was more. Pick one typeface and go.

Not long thereafter I began receiving digital submissions, on a floppy disk (which came on the market about the same time as steam engines) or as an attached file. I liked that much better. Why? Because, you see, once I pulled up the manuscript on screen, no matter how carefully it had been laid out by the author, I could change it all to Times New Roman.

photo credit: Pixabay-PublicDomainPictures

Author: Andy Le Peau

I've been an editor and writer for over forty years. I am passionate about ideas and how we can express them clearly, beautifully, and persuasively. I love reading good books, talking about them, and recommending them. I thoroughly enjoy my family who help me continue on the path of a lifelong learner.

10 thoughts on “Just My Type (1)”

  1. Hey Andy,
    FYI, there is research to show that serif types are easier to read and therefore more important for books and article. But back in the 80s when cpu screens had trouble with the nuances of pixels the screen/font mavens started using incredible ugly fonts which didn’t pixellate and thus was born the use of san serif text copy. We are still living with this tsunami today. But I will say that if I receive an eText or manuscript in a sans serif font then I KNOW I am dealing with an amateur and my instinct is to reject. But I don’t always do that, even most of the time my assumption is correct and I do reject. But today, at least, I can change the font so I can read the text. Thank God

    1. Right you are, Roy. I am familiar with the research. And that cheered me. It makes all kinds of sense. I am frustrated that Calibri is the default for Word. But I persistently resist.

  2. Have you considered adopting Times New Roman on your website? I used it for awhile, but changed to sans-serif fonts based on a WebAIM survey. Evidently, most people with disabilities prefer sans-serif on computer screens. Even so, I’m with you. Personally, I love Times New Roman.

    1. Hi Jeremy. Yes, I have thought about Times New Roman or some other serif face for my blog. It hasn’t been urgent for me because I try to keep each of my posts brief. And in my mind san serif faces aren’t overly problematic in such contexts. But I will think about it more, certainly. Andy

  3. I’d never hate you for liking TImes New Roman. Fonts are a matter of preference. However, as a reader, I hate it. As Jeremy noted, those with disabilities, in my case a visual impairment Times New Roman is terrible to read. Those serifs that you like for me make letters harder to distinguish. At itmes, I will pick up a book that has TNR in 11 or 10 point fonts and put the book down, with no intention of reading it, ever. I’ll ake Arial any day over TNR. It really bothers me that the publishing world expects MSS in TNR. I write in Arial 12, select all, and then convert it to TNR. In my current position, which inlcudes making short tutorial videos, I add captioning and with WCAG 2.0 and readers like me in mind, all those cpations are in Verdana. Material I create for our webiste is all Verdana 14
    The only time I prefer TNR is when I am writing a cover letter. Times New Roman enables me to squeeze a lot more characters on a page than Arial. I can turn a three-page draft into a two-page final product. Otherwise, I avoid TRN like the Corona Virus, to update an old saying. Since it is the standard for publishing, I wouldn’t submit anything that wasn’t TRN, of couse, and there’s little I can about that. No publisher would wnat to hire someone with eyes like mine to edit anything and I understand that. I really do like it, howver, when I can get qa books as a PDF, convert it to MS Worst I mean Word, and chagne the font to Arial 12.

    1. Since I can’t seem to delete a post that has to be approved first, let me try this far better spell-checked version as a reply.
      I’d never hate you for liking Times New Roman. Fonts are a matter of preference. However, as a reader, I hate it. As Jeremy noted, those with disabilities, in my case a visual impairment Times New Roman is terrible to read. Those serifs that you like for me make letters harder to distinguish. At times, I will pick up a book that has TNR in 11- or 10-point fonts and put the book down, with no intention of reading it, ever. I’ll take Arial any day over TNR. It really bothers me that the publishing world expects MSS in TNR. I write in Arial 12, select all, and then convert it to TNR. In my current position, which includes making short tutorial videos, I add captioning and with WCAG 2.0 and readers like me in mind, all those captions are in Verdana. Material I create for our website is all Verdana 14
      The only time I prefer TNR is when I am writing a cover letter. Times New Roman enables me to squeeze a lot more characters on a page than Arial. I can turn a three-page draft into a two-page final product. Otherwise, I avoid TRN like the Corona Virus, to update an old saying. Since it is the standard for publishing, I wouldn’t submit anything that wasn’t TRN, of course, and there’s little I can about that. No publisher would want to hire someone with eyes like mine to edit anything and I understand that. I really do like it, however, when I can get a book as a PDF, convert it to MS Word, and change the font to Arial 12.
      Reply

    2. Hi Ken. Good to hear from you. I am with you and Jeremy that people should use whatever typeface helps them read better and more easily. And as you note, that means san serif faces for some. That’s a benefit of ebook readers as well as laptops–you can change typefaces and size to what suits one best. And yes, different typefaces for different purposes, just as you are doing. I guess we are likeminded in making global changes to books and manuscripts so we can have a better reading experience. We just go different directions with that. Glad you have found what helps you. Carry on. Andy

  4. Hi Andy: I just wanted to say that I too love Times New Roman. I get frustrated with Microsoft Word because no matter what I do it keeps Calibri 12-point as the default font, when I want it to be Times New Roman 14-point. And in general I love typefaces with serifs. The ones without are boring as far as I’m concerned!

    Thank you for today’s post! It’s wonderful to find likeminded people out there!

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