Kevin Chong is the author of Baroque-a-nova, Good looks bonus Pity, and Neil Young Nation. His most new book, My Year of the Racehorse, was just published by Greystone Books. He will be guest restriction The Afterword all this week.

Typography Style

Recently, I’ve started reading e-books. I know some people who have been sucked into e-reading but are less engrossed with the form. The typesetting and design of the original are lost in their electronic complement. In particular, they are sickened that a reader could even choose a font to apply to a text; they feel some of the book’s original purpose is compromised when its production conforms to the iBooks standard. In their mind, mucking about with a font is like giving the reader the selection of choosing the protagonist’s name.

But is a font such an important thing to a reading experience? Are writers exacting about the fonts used on their word processors and in their finished books. I posed this question to a group of writers – who are frequently, but not exclusively, Canadian. I’ve categorized their responses by their favourite font, and in order of status.

• Times New Roman

• Arial

• Courier

• Garamond

• Comic Sans

• Papyrus

• Palatino

• Century Schoolbook and Georgia

• Didot

• Australian Sunset