Codex Project

Latest revision as of 05:39, 12 February 2009

I aim to typeset Luigi Serafini's Codex Serafinianus with the help of a tool that makes it cheap and easy for printers to cast their own type.

The goals of this project:

• Celebrate the physical process of typesetting
• Develop a typographer's relationship with the presently

incomprehensible Codex Serafinianus

• Introduce the self replicating three dimensional printer as a tool

for printers and book artists

The Deal/Spiel

It is no unusual feeling to hear of a book and be overcome with the need to read it. And today's world continues to make it easier to satisfy that need. But there are some books that Amazon will never sell, like the Necronomicon, the Encyclopedia Galactica, Julian Carax's Shadow of the Wind and Pierre Menard's Don Quixote. We were introduced to these books because they were plot elements in works of fiction. We will never read these books, no matter our desire, and nobody ever has or ever will ever read any of them. These books are lost and we must be content to read them vicariously through fictional people.

But what if there were an exception, a fictional book that exists but is tangible only literally? What would it mean to explore such a book, and what satisfaction could come? Luigi Serafini's Codex Serafinianus, only a few years older than me, is such a book. An unnatural history written in an unknown alphabet, the Codex has vexed hobbyist and professional cryptographers alike. Only its page numbering system has been cracked. As long as it goes untranslated it remains unreadable, and the Codex Serafinianus remains a fictional work.

I have felt the overwhelming desire to read too many fictional books. If it is possible for me to know even one, I will not hesitate to do so. And as a printer, I know that there is no better way to develop a relationship with a book than to typeset it. The process of typesetting is a meditation and an exploration. The meditative aspect of typesetting is central to this project. And though no foundry casts the alphabet of the Codex, today's world has provided a tool that will allow me to literally print my own type. This tool is called the "reprap", a contraction of "self replicating rapid prototyper". This machine can print %60 of its own parts, in addition to any other three dimensional object smaller than its own nine inch bed. It works by depositing successive layers of plastic according to the specifications of a computer model of the desired object. Its ability to print itself makes it incredibly cheap and accessible to anyone. Its ability to print any other 3-D object makes it useful beyond what anyone can presently conceive. With reprap and a computer, I will be able to design faces for the language of the Codex and print fonts of them. With a complete case of home-cast type, I will be able to set the Codex Serafinianus and do the impossible: I will intimately know one fictional book.

About Me:

I am a printer and book artist about to start doctoral work in informatics and cognitive science at the University of Indiana, doing analytic work on models of use in the study of mind. I participate passionately in all facets of the book arts, from writing through printing to publishing. My current preoccupation in this vast field of inquiry is typography and typesetting.

Links:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Seraphinianus http://www.amazon.com/Codex-serafinianus/dp/8821600262 (notably empty. "Latin"?) http://reprap.org http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fictional_books http://worldwideweb.unconventionallylonguniformresourcelocator.com (Personal website)

Current State