An alphabet in the window

Text: an original contemporary design-review-style practice extract.

The lettering shop displayed the same sentence in twelve typefaces. At first, I read the words only once. The remaining lines seemed to repeat information I had already acquired. Then the shopkeeper asked which version sounded most impatient.

Nothing on the glass made a sound. Yet a narrow, crowded line seemed to hurry me towards its final word, while a widely spaced version made room for a slower reading. I noticed the shape of a letter I normally passed through without seeing. The sentence had not changed, but the attention it requested had.

I would not claim that every reader must hear the same voice in those letters. The shopkeeper and I disagreed about one especially rounded version. That disagreement made the display more useful. Twelve repetitions had become twelve choices, and the familiar words were no longer the only part of the sentence worth reading.

Analyse how the writer uses language and structure to interest and engage the reader.

In your answer, consider:

• language features and techniques
• structural techniques
• the effect on the reader.

Support your views with detailed reference to the extract.