Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Welcome to series four of the Life of Letters, a podcast exploring the art history and future of calligraphy, handwriting and all things letter related.
I'm your host, Laura Edrilyn, a London based calligrapher with a curious mind on a journey to connect with artists, historians, experts and letter lovers around the world. This season is once again kindly supported by Speedball Art, who continue to help celebrate the tools and traditions that keep the written word alive.
Don't forget, if you want to find out more about the guest, the podcast or me, check out the show notes.
Let's dive into the episode.
[00:00:39] Speaker B: In today's episode, I'm delighted to be speaking with Nina Tran. Nina is a calligraphy instructor based in Los Angeles. She teaches a variety of pointed pen scripts and gothic style hands. Calligraphy aside, she also enjoys reading, knitting and being out in nature.
Nina, firstly, a huge welcome to the Life of Letters podcast. I'm so excited to be talking to you today.
[00:01:02] Speaker C: Laurel, I'm so excited to be here. Thank you for having me. Hello to you, hello to Heidi, and hello to all of your listeners. Thank you for having me today.
[00:01:13] Speaker B: Thank you, Nina. And to be honest, that little intro bio totally downplays the kind of incredible person that you are and the person you are to a lot of people especially.
I've seen all your work on Instagram, Instagram, and all the things that you've done over the last however many years, which we're going to come on to. But I, I know that a lot of people will be familiar with your name and have met you at various calligraphy events and all sorts of things.
I wanted to start back in sort of 2015, which I think is where your calligraphy journey began. Can you tell us where this interest in calligraphy came from?
[00:01:54] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah. I actually, I thought about this question and it's funny how our story changes over the years.
I think that if you had asked this question in 2016, I probably would have told you a different story.
As I was thinking about the story, Laura, I was like, you know, I think calligraphy actually came to me. It hunted me down. I was just minding my own business, you know, and calligraphy found me actually when I was about 13 or 14.
So this was in 1998 and I was given a calligraphy kit and it was like an italic, it was a fountain pen kit and it had an exemplar of italic and gothic stuff in it.
And I, I loved this kit so much that I read every, everything and one thing that I remember reading was take care of your pen take, keep it clean.
And so I took that a little bit too seriously. And so after every single time I used the fountain pen, I would take it apart, I would wash it and then dry it and then, you know, let it dry. And then the next day I would practice again. I would reassemble it, put the cartridge in, and I would practice for, you know, 30 minutes to an hour. And then I would disassemble it and clean it. And you know what that does to a fountain pen, right?
Oh, no.
So I had this kit and I think it came with eight cartridges.
And it, the cartridges only lasted me about two weeks because I kept washing it out and cleaning it like I thought I was supposed to do. Not really knowing that. No, you can keep the ink in there, you could keep it together. It just means, you know, keep the nib clean and free of debris. But I didn't know that. And so after about two weeks, the kit ran out of ink and I thought, well, that was nice. And then I just kind of set it aside and I, at the time, I didn't know that you could buy more ink cartridges. And also I lived in a household where art was kind of not really encouraged. Like it was a waste of time kind of thing that you're doing. You should really be focusing on math and English and homework, like the real stuff. So I just never asked. And I didn't know that you could keep going and buy more stuff. And I just really had no idea. So that was my short lived introduction to calligraphy when I was about 14. And then in 2000, at the end of 2014, one of my colleagues or friends from college, she just got, she got engaged and she was like, Neo, you know, could you help me write some signage for my wedding? It's going to be next year, you know, we have some time. And I thought, you know, I've done some calligraphy before, we could totally do that. And so she was the one who invited me to collaborate with her and to help her out with these things. So I feel like I, I didn't really plan to do calligraphy, just came to me. So that's how I feel about it. I don't think that I had a, an innate interest for it per se, but it was just like handed over to me and presented to me and I was just, I just kind of snatched it and ran with it, I guess.
[00:05:04] Speaker B: Incredible. And absolutely reinforces the statement that, that Paul had mentioned, Paul Antonio had said in his episode, which was, you know, calligraphy equals you, you don't go and seek it out particularly. It's not something that people go off and go, right, I'm going to go and learn calligraphy. Something tends to spark an interest in it or get us involved in it. And, yeah, that's incredible that it's had two little touch points for you once when you were a bit younger, and then it's brought back again by a friend. So I think that's incredible. And then so from there, I mean, I've been nosing around your lovely website. I could see that you've hosted an incredible amount of workshops. I mean, the list is. Is just endless. It's fantastic. And lots of Instagram lives inspiring people to learn and practice their calligraphy. And I've tuned into a few of your. Is it the Q&As that you do?
[00:06:01] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah.
[00:06:02] Speaker B: And I love those. I mean, firstly, do tell us a little bit about the workshops and the Q and A's that you do. But what I really want to ask you about is what made you become a teacher?
[00:06:13] Speaker C: Okay, this is another question where I.
I thought I knew the answer.
[00:06:19] Speaker B: And I. And I do.
[00:06:20] Speaker C: I do. First, I actually don't know that I wanted to become a teacher. I think I've always enjoyed sharing things that I learned, but I don't think I was like, I'm going to become a teacher today. It wasn't a thing that I had signed myself up for. And I have a funny story, and I'm always a little bit worried about sharing it because I don't know if it's going to lessen my credibility, but never.
[00:06:46] Speaker B: You couldn't.
[00:06:48] Speaker C: Well, it's too late now, I think. Okay. So when I first started calligraphy with my friend who was getting married, she was wanting to get her sisters involved in calligraphy because she's like, I think we're going to need some help doing this stuff. And so she wanted to get her sisters in on it. And I said, okay, let's get together and let's do a little tutorial or let's practice together or whatever. And I also said I might have a couple of friends who might be interested in joining us. And she's like, sure. So we ended up gathering eight women for a tutorial. It wasn't really a workshop or anything. We were just going to show them what calligraphy was and how much fun it was.
And I was in charge of buying the supplies for this tutorial. So I went with one of my friends and we went to the art store, and we were just gathering Supplies and ready to check out. You know, I had like eight nibs, eight of this and eight of that, eight pen holders. And I was checking out, and the checker was like, do you have a discount card with us? And I thought, no, but how do I get one of those? And she said, well, you need to be a senior citizen, a student, or a teacher. And I thought, I am not a senior citizen. I'm not a student, and I'm not a teacher. So I said, no, I, I don't have, you know, I don't qualify for a discount. And my friend who was with me was like, you are a teacher. And I'm like, I am? She's like, yeah, what are you buying all these supplies for? And I thought, okay, I'm a teacher. Sure, I'm a teacher.
[00:08:24] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:08:24] Speaker C: And so the girl was like, oh, okay, I just need your name, your phone number, your address.
And she was typ out my information. And I thought, okay, I just need to leave. This time I'll be coming back.
[00:08:36] Speaker B: No one ask me any more questions, right?
[00:08:40] Speaker C: And so as she was packing my things in a bag, she's like, so, so what do you teach?
And I thought, oh, my goodness. I, I, I, I teach calligraphy. And she's like, that's amazing, because we're actually looking for a calligraphy teacher.
[00:08:57] Speaker B: Teacher? Yeah. No way.
[00:08:59] Speaker C: Yeah.
And so I was looking at my friend, and she was looking at me like, well, don't look at me, you know?
So what ended up happening that same day is she called her manager over, and mind you, she's already got my name. There's probably a camera somewhere filming the whole thing happening. You know, I, I couldn't just bolt out.
So she calls the manager over, and she's like, hey, she's a calligraphy teacher. And he was like, wow, really? Like, could you teach for us here? We're looking for a calligraphy teacher. And I, I honestly didn't know what to say. And so I said, okay. And, and at this point, I had only been doing calligraphy for a month, so that was it. And he asked if I could teach in March. So this was February 2015.
He was asking me to teach in March. And I, I, I just couldn't back out because I was so ashamed that I had lied to these innocent people about who I was and what I did.
And so for that month, Laura, I was studying like crazy. I was trying to read and try to get as much knowledge and practice as I could. And luckily, my first set of students, I only had I think two or three students, and I think two of them were young high school girls, and one was like kind of an elderly lady. But still, I didn't under. I didn't realize the weight and the responsibility of a teacher. And also I didn't realize how much work it took to prepare to teach somebody.
So that was an accident. And then that same art supply group would ask me to come back again. So I talked to them about four times that year or in two years before they kind of closed down.
[00:10:47] Speaker B: But how serendipitous that, you know, you arrived at an art store to get something and it just, again, sort of forced you into it slightly. I mean, you could have said, no, I'm not a teacher. You could have said, no, I don't want to teach, even though I am a teacher. You could have said so many different things. But obviously that's led you down a path and, you know, just finding those opportunities and knowing that, well, not knowing where it's going to take you. And obviously now you've taught to hundreds of students, possibly thousands, and all these Instagram lives as well. So tell us a little bit about the Q and A's that you do as well.
[00:11:26] Speaker C: Yeah, there's a little bit of backstory. I feel like every story has a backstory.
[00:11:30] Speaker B: Good. That's what we want. We want the backstories.
[00:11:33] Speaker C: Okay.
Get your tea and cozy. So are you familiar with the hustle culture?
[00:11:40] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:11:41] Speaker C: So I, I feel like there's a new hustle culture that's kind of emerging, but there was the one that was happening around 2010, 2015, like, you know, in that time.
And I just so happened to be kind of interested in that at the time. I felt like that was something that was really resonating with me because I was a stay at home mom. And so I, I felt like I, I didn't have going on outside of my family little bubble. And so the hustle culture really appealed to me because during that time I was having a midlife crisis where.
[00:12:18] Speaker B: Mid.
[00:12:19] Speaker C: Midlife crisis. A quarter life crisis.
I was only 30, but I was having a crisis because I had gone to college, but I wasn't doing anything with the thing that I studied. And I was just. And I'm doing air quotes for those of you who can't see. I was just a stay at home mom. And so I just felt like I didn't have a lot of self esteem, I didn't have a lot of confidence. I felt like I had kind of maybe missed out on the career thing. That all my friends were doing. And so I was wanting some success in my life, but I just didn't know how to do that without going into the workforce. You know, there was only so many. There were only so many things that I could claim success in.
You know what I mean? Of course, raising children is a whole other topic that we could talk about, I'm sure. But, you know, something that was just mine, I. I didn't really have that. I was giving and giving to my family and my friends, but it was as far as my own self. I didn't have something that was just mine to have and control and.
And be proud of. And so when you're in the hustle culture, you kind of recognize other people who are also in the, you know, with having the hustle vibe. And I met this girl who was wanting to do challenges, and he was like, let's do a challenge. And it started with ABC's challenge, and she and I actually started an account called the hand lettered ABCs here on Instagram. And we would host challenges weekly challenges of like, write a letter a day, or we would have a theme of the week or a theme of the month, like write something in black and white or write something with flourishes. You know, it was a real fun thing. And we were able to really not just practice together, but get other people excited about practicing with some kind of direction.
[00:14:12] Speaker B: So where are you? Have you already learned a bit of calligraphy by this stage, or is this after you've done a bit of the teaching?
[00:14:20] Speaker C: So this is all in 2015?
I feel like a lot of my calligraphy journey has really been because I was at the right place at the right time.
And when you don't know what you're getting yourself into, you're more likely to say yes to it. Right.
And when you do know how much work something's going to take, you're a little bit more hesitant, and you're like, let me think about that, because I'm not sure I actually have time for it. But when you don't know what you don't know, you're like, that sounds easy. So anyway, this weekly challenge thing became kind of a part of how I practice.
And so when the new year started in 2016, I was like, I'm gonna do an Alphabet challenge. I'm gonna write a copper plate minuscule letter every single day, and I'm going to do it live.
And anybody who wants to join me can join me. And I'm going to talk about this letter, how it's constructed its dimensions, its slant. Like, everything that I know about this letter, I'm going to share it live.
And thing about being on social media is when you say, laura, I'm gonna have a podcast out next week.
[00:15:32] Speaker B: You gotta do it.
[00:15:33] Speaker C: You gotta do it. Yeah. So some. So I said, I'm gonna do this challenge at the beginning of the year. And I was freaking out because I was like, this was gonna be something that I was doing by myself outside of, you know, that cluttered ABCs group.
But I did it. And.
And I really enjoyed sharing. I really enjoyed the interaction that people were asking, like, what pen are you using? Or, what's the pen angle? And. And how did. Can you show that stroke again? And I just really enjoyed doing that.
[00:16:05] Speaker B: Wow.
[00:16:06] Speaker C: I was. I was doing the Alphabet challenge just until the 26th letter. So just 26 days, and I probably only had five or 10 people.
I think gradually, you know, as I got further and further into the Alphabet, I gained maybe one or two more people. And then by the end of that, it became a thing.
It was like, what are you gonna do next? And I thought. I hadn't thought that far. I wasn't planning. There wasn't a next. But then I started doing a boot camp because I realized that people really enjoyed the writing along. I think they enjoyed the sense of community as well.
So that became a bootcamp. And then eventually it just became a Q and A, like, well, let's just hang out every Tuesday or Wednesday or Thursday or whatever. I could find time. And then it became regular. It was like, okay, it's going to be every Tuesday. It's going to be every Wednesday. It changed over time, but it was like, it's going to be at this time, this place.
See you there. And then it's just stuck.
[00:17:06] Speaker B: Amazing. But that sense of community that you then grew from that. Not only the accountability that it gave you having to do it, but also allowing people into your. Your space and your time. And obviously, you're raising a family at the time. Were you also working or were you just able to make this kind of carve out a little bit of time in your. In your day?
[00:17:29] Speaker C: Yeah. So I was working up until my son was about 2. Okay. And it was. I just. I didn't work anymore. It was a decision that we made as a family.
So I didn't have the time during the day, but at nighttime when everybody was asleep, that was my time. I was actually part of a community that was waking up at. I think it was 5am or 6am and you had a partner who would text you like, hey, Nina, are you awake? And if you didn't text back, he would call you or she would call you to make sure that you're awake. Because this club that I was a part of, we would practice in the morning. The morning was the most sacred time of the day where. Because everybody was still asleep.
[00:18:12] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:18:13] Speaker C: And so you had about maybe an hour to do whatever you wanted during that morning. And so that was part of my, my practice was just getting the time, carving the time in, in the morning and just crazy early hours and then reserving a time at the, in the evening when everybody was asleep and kitchen was clean and everything was picked up and we just. That would be kind of like my winding down time.
[00:18:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I can totally relate to that. I cannot at all relate to the 5 o' clock in the morning. I mean, I'm like a zombie until about 7:30, 8:00'. Clock. I don't know what my calligraphy would look like at 5 o' clock in the morning. But yeah, that carving out the time, I think is a really interesting point that you make because with any sort of art form there is a sense of practice that is needed. And I think if you really enjoy it, it makes it that much easier. Obviously it doesn't become this kind of study chore thing, but that regular time that you can identify and if it gives you something back. Like I always talk about it being my little sanctuary, especially when I was having mental health issues. And I really struggled to kind of find that balance of dealing with the overwhelm of the day, having two kids at home, you know, or school and then coming home and the sort of work life balance and all of those things, if have something like calligraphy that then becomes part of that practice and that, that moment in your day where you can wind down. I think it's.
I think it's incredible. I think it's a very beneficial thing that you can have as part of your kind of well being toolkit. Right. But you are also sharing that with other people, which again is a huge thing. If you're doing something solo. It can be really easy to give up when you're doing something, whether it is on Instagram or with a community or through a bootcamp or something that is. Yeah, there's more people involved. That's. That's brilliant.
And were you at that point focusing your practice on a particular style? Was that mostly copper plate at that point or were you starting to explore other things?
[00:20:18] Speaker C: So when I first, first started with my friend who was getting married. She wanted us to do the whimsical modern style. And I just loved it so much. It was so fun and bouncy and kind of erratic sometimes. And I was like, I need this.
I love it so much. It's so beautiful.
And so that's actually where I started. I started with attempting to learn modern calligraphy, but we didn't really know how to learn it. In fact, we thought that learning it meant just copying something that already existed. And so my friend had a Pinterest board of samples that we could copy. And, you know, to an untrained eye, it all looks the same. And now when I look back on it, I'm like, this one is bouncing a little bit more. This one is a little bit more slanter. This one's a little bit rounder or tighter packed. And so because we had.
We were trying to copy 50 different things, like, oh, let's do the name cards like this person. Let's do the menu like this, and let's write on the bottles like this. And, you know, I thought it was all the same, but it was all really different. And I didn't understand why. Why it. Why not. Why does it. Why isn't it not working? And, of course, the samples that you see are different from the things that you actually need to write. It was just too hard. I think that I. I couldn't. I couldn't do it, and I couldn't do it the way that I was seeing it. And I was really frustrated, and I actually was very close to just giving up calligraphy. I was like, you know, this is a lot harder than I remember it being. And it looked. Certainly looks a lot easier than it is than actually doing it, until for those of you who are on Instagram, you know what it's like to go on Instagram and you find something and you click on that something, and then that something has a link or mentions to somebody, and then you click on that, and then you click on click, click, click, click, click. And then next thing you know, you are going down this rabbit hole, and you end up finding something that you're like, I have no idea how I got here moment. And I ended up finding a person named Dr. Gail Madalag. And she posted something that was really intriguing to me. And what fascinated me about her post was that it was kind of calligraphy, but not.
It was like a page with a bunch of ovals and a bunch of U shapes, and they were just side by side.
And I was like, what Are you doing? What are you doing? You know, what is that? And I read her caption, and her caption said something about doing drills.
And I was like, oh, this sounds. This sounds important. What is a drill? And then she, you know, goes on and talks about how drills are basically practicing basic strokes. And I. My mind was blown. I was like, basic strokes? What do you. What do you mean? What do you mean, basic strokes?
[00:23:10] Speaker B: There's a formula to this.
[00:23:11] Speaker C: Yeah.
And then I read, because it was a really long caption that she wrote. And then towards the end, she was thanking somebody named Dr. Joe Vitolo or somebody, I don't know, some guy. And she mentioned copper plate script. And I was like, okay, who is this Dr. Joe Vitolo guy? And what in the world is copper plate script?
What do you mean there are basic strokes? What do you mean? You should do drills to practice, like these. It just blew my mind because I love logical things. I love things that are put in an order or like step by step ways. I love defining what things are and identifying them so that I could put them together and so that we could talk about them. And so here was this modern calligraphy thing on Pinterest that I was copying, that I didn't know anything about what was going on in those letters. And then here's this presentation of how to practice, what to practice.
And she also, in her post, she would point out details like this, and this should be the same height. And she was really kind of illuminating a method for learning. And so I, I had to know more about what this copper plate script was. And so I.
I guess that would be my first formal hand that I tried to learn.
[00:24:36] Speaker B: Isn't that amazing, though, that again, I mean, it's just all these dots lining up. The fact that you'd gone down a rabbit hole, happened to find her, Happened to find her post. I just. I love that, and I love that it sparked just as you were about to go. Do you know what? This isn't for me. I can't do it. I can't get my head around it. Actually, hang on a minute. Something's unlocking here. Hang on. There is a way to do it, and I can do it. And I get to totally enjoy it as well because it ticks all the boxes that fuel your interest in learning something, which is. Is brilliant. And that. So you. I know you've got copper plate gothic styles that you do. You do modern monoline and Spencerian and stunt Roman, which I desperately want to ask you what that is. But what, what was Your kind of process to learn all of these different ones, or did you got copper plate under your belt where you like, right. Teach me everything.
[00:25:32] Speaker C: Right? Yes. Yes to all of that.
[00:25:35] Speaker B: Yes, all of it.
[00:25:37] Speaker A: If you're enjoying this episode and fancy supporting the podcast, you can literally buy us a coffee.
[00:25:43] Speaker B: Head to the link in the show notes.
[00:25:45] Speaker A: It's a lovely way to help keep the life of letters going. Thank you. Now, let's get back to the episode.
[00:25:53] Speaker C: I'm just going to keep going back to being at the right place at the right time, because that person that I follow, Dr. Gail Madalag, she's no longer on Instagram.
So I started calligraphy December 2014. And in January 2015, I was like, I don't think I could do this calligraphy thing. And I found her just at the right time. And so I immediately shamelessly asked her, how.
How. How can I do what you're doing?
How can I become you? You're so cool. I love you so much. You know, totally fangirling over her.
And she was so modest and humble. She was like, you know, I. I just learned from Dr. Vitolo, go check out his books and his website and his. His free book. And I did, and I devoured his website and his free ebook. But I asked her, could you please mentor me?
And she's like, I. I'm not me. I'm. I'm not a mentor. Like, I've never mentored anybody before in my life. And I'm like, please, I just want to know what you're doing, you know, and how you do it. And she's like, okay, tell you what, I don't know that I.
I can say yes to being your mentor, but you can ask me any questions you.
And I said, deal, Deal.
And I told her, okay, where should I start? And the first thing that she told me to do is to focus on one thing. And I said, what are you talking about? I am focusing on one thing. She's like, no, you're.
This thing that you're doing here looks like copper plate, and this thing that you're doing here looks like Spencerian. I'm like, spencerian? What's Spencerian? You know, because I was kind of doing a handwriting thing with shades on it, and she's like, okay, you just need to pick one. And I'm like, I didn't even know that I was doing two things, so I had to pick one, and I chose copper plate.
So for that whole year, I only did copper plate. And again, just being part of that hustle culture and being part of that community. That said, that was waking up at 5am One of the things that was instilled in that group was to focus on one thing for two years.
So do one thing every single day for two years and don't expect anything. And anything that happens, anything that sprouts from this endeavor of doing, showing up, just count it as a bonus, count it as a fluke, even. Don't even expect that it's going to happen again. But any opportunity that arises from you showing up and doing the work, you know, that's great. But just focus on mastering a thing. So I really took that to heart and I really did take Dr. Madala's advice and just focus on copperplate. And then the next year, 2017, I was like, I think I might be ready for, for Spencerian because Harvest Crittenden was teaching an online workshop. I think it was like early in the year. So I thought, I think I have to do it because I don't want to miss this online opportunity. So I, I did that. And for that year, I was doing both copper plate and Spencerian, trying to learn those two together. And I think what's great about having kind of a solid ground already or solid foundation on copper plate allowed me to tackle Spencerian. Because I was so familiar with copper plate, I was able to compartmentalize the two.
I wasn't confused about what they each were. I could recognize readily what the differences were. And so I feel like when you try to learn three, four different things at the same time, it's hard to compartmentalize, especially when you're brand new, you know.
So I feel like having started with copperplate and really just focusing on that before jumping into something new, but was still kind of similar. It was still with the pointed pen. It was kind of an easy transition, in my opinion, because of that groundwork that I did for the whole year.
[00:29:35] Speaker B: Yeah.
Yeah. Amazing. And then you just thought, oh, well, I've done these two. I'll just get a broad edge pen and have a go at some Gothic styles as well.
[00:29:47] Speaker C: Kind of. Kind of. So I had no intention of doing the broad edge at the time. I was just so in love with the pointed pen. But Barbara called Zalari. Do you. Are you familiar with her work?
[00:29:57] Speaker B: Hey.
[00:29:57] Speaker C: So she's an Italian calligrapher and she's also an INF certified master penman.
So I just, I loved her pointed pen stuff. And she was coming to California to teach and she was teaching something called Gothicized italic. And I Was like, I don't know what that is, but I like her, so I'm gonna go and take her class. And so that was kind of my reintroduction to the broad edge. And it just so happened to be a gothic style.
I. I would have signed up to any class that she.
[00:30:27] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:30:28] Speaker C: Is going to come and teach. So that was in 2017, two years after I had started.
[00:30:35] Speaker B: Wow.
And then. Can you tell me what stunt Roman is? I've seen a couple of images, but can you describe it for me?
[00:30:44] Speaker C: Okay, so style that was developed during the age of sign writing. You had these. These sign writers who had to create signage for, like, fruits or they had to create signage or sale signs outside of, you know, on. On windows to show, like, if sale was happening or if there was a deal or basically advertise things that were for sale. So. Oh, show cards. They're called show cards.
[00:31:12] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:31:12] Speaker C: People were writing show cards, and they needed to write war write letters that were punchy, that were, like, interesting and not, you know, ordinary and boring. And so something that was stunt was kind of, like, showy and flashy. And stunt Roman are kind of showy. Flashy, showing off letters based on Roman letters. So, like, foundational or humanistic or Roman capitals, even.
So it's those letters, but you play with them. And so you compress some letters and you exaggerate the roundness or width of some letters. And so when you compress certain letters, particularly letters that have. That are vertical, that have a lot of, like, vertical strokes in them, and then you exaggerate the ones that have curves in them, you get this contrast between really tight, tightly packed letters and really wide letters. So it's your eyes kind of like, oh, your eyes are intrigued because there's this pattern that's been being broken where you're so used to seeing letters that are well spaced. All the letters have similar counter spaces. And here's one where it's, like, visually appealing because of the contrast between narrow and wide letters.
And it was just really playful, a playful way to play with Roman letters and give them kind of a new look.
[00:32:34] Speaker B: Wow. I love that. Yeah. So, and with those letters, are you. What kind of nib or pen or tool are you using to create that particular style?
[00:32:47] Speaker C: So that style. You can find samples of a lot of different ways to write Roman letters in books like the Speedball textbook. And in the Speedball textbook, of course, it's a speedball textbook that was designed to sort of promote and advertise their pens.
So in those. In the. In the book, they suggest writing it with a Speedball C nib, I think size 5 or size 6, a really thin one. And they also have monoline nibs. And that's called the Speedball B series, where it's. It's a nib. It's a bent nib.
Okay. So the story goes is that the person who was inventing this nib was writing and he dropped his pen onto the floor and it bent. I don't know if how true that story is, but instead of tossing the pen, he decided to play around with it and he just had this idea of creating this bent nib series. Anyway, so in the Spivol textbook, they recommend using these bent nibs, but for me, I just use a ballpoint pen or just a mechanical pencil or Sharpie or just a regular marker. Any really monoline tool. So for. For Min I st Roman, I just use monoline tools.
[00:33:57] Speaker B: Great. And I guess it's more. Is it more about hand drawing the letters rather than stroke by stroke created letters?
[00:34:05] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, I do both. So I do the model line part, which is stroke by stroke. But then I also teach a sketchy stunt Roman style, and that's. We really pencil in the serifs and fill in little things and really give shape to the letters by building up the letters.
[00:34:22] Speaker B: Okay, my last question about scripts. I've picked your brains enough, but I actually, I'm not hugely familiar with the Spencerian script myself, but I know there's a bit of a difference between Spencerian and copper plate. What would you say really sets them apart and maybe even when might you choose to use either of those styles?
[00:34:42] Speaker C: Yeah, so that's a very good question.
[00:34:45] Speaker B: Well, thanks.
[00:34:49] Speaker C: I.
I feel like Spencerian is. Is a. Is a much lighter hand in terms of not being as shaded as copper plate. As, you know, copper plate has every downstroke or nearly every downstroke has a thick. It is thick. You know, you apply pressure to the pen and you get a thick stroke. Whereas in Spencerian, first off, not every letter can be shaded, which is interesting. So, for instance, the letter E is typically not shaded, whereas a letter like an A, sometimes it can be shaded, sometimes it could just be a hairline. So it's. There's a bit of choice as well. But there are some letters that are like, no, we don't usually shade that, at least not in the standard style of Spencerian. Of course, you could shade whatever you want. And there are even rules for, like the letter N or the letter M, where you.
All of your downstrokes are hairlines. Except if you do want to add shade, you only shade the last leg of the M or the end, so you don't shade both downstrokes. So that's one big difference between Copper Plate and Spenceri is the shades. Whereas copper plate, every letter has to have at least one shade, you know, has to have shade, whereas Spinceri doesn't. And another difference between Copper Plate and Spencerian is that copper plate usually lift more.
Where is. In Spencerian, yes, you still lift, but in Copper Plate, you have to lift. Like, for instance, if you're making a letter A, you make your entry stroke, then you lift, then you make your oval, then you lift, and then you make your U shape, and then you lift. Whereas in Spencerian, if you wanted to make an O, you can string the entry stroke without lifting. You go into your oval and without lifting from your oval, you can have your exit stroke. So it's very. It's much more cursive and much more fluid. Of course, you could lift after any of those strokes if you wanted to, if you wanted to adjust your paper, if you wanted to scratch your nose or. Or take a break, maybe you've had enough of the O for the day. But there's a bit more fluidity in the Spencerian. It really is more of like a handwriting. Whereas, you know, copper plate, as you. As you know, was also a handwriting and it became kind of formalized. So it's interesting how when you write something on paper and you give it to an engraver who's going to engrave it onto copper plates.
You know, if I'm an engraver who wants to showcase my skills in engraving, I'm going to probably, you know, iron out some of your wiggly strokes. And, you know, that oval, and that oval on your script is not really that good. And so a part of the writer's integrity that was on the piece of paper is lost when I got to the engraver, because the engraver was kind of like photoshopping it and which was great. I think that to some degree it did. It was good. It helped to kind of standardize a letter, especially if they're going into copy books. But then as a student picking up the copy book, I'm looking at the copy book and I'm like, oh, this is. Everything has to be perfect and everything has to be, like, all aligned and all the thickness of the shades have to be the same. And so the handwriting, the handwritten or the handwriting essence of copper plate or English round hand kind of became calligraphic because in of the engravers, whether it actually looked like what it was supposed to look like or not. The student who then got the book was copying something that was kind of perfect.
Yeah, Yeah.
[00:38:21] Speaker B: I love the journey that. That you've taken us on and. And that kind of the storytelling of how many people are just being involved in the evolution of some of these scripts and why they've ended up in the way that they have, and also how we've come full circle to enjoy them again. And they are really quite a precious and treasured kind of art form that a lot more people are getting into and excited about. As a sort of final question to our conversation this series, we're going to be asking guests this quite challenging question. I know. If you thought it's been challenging so far, I'm going to throw this at you. What is your favorite letter and why?
[00:39:00] Speaker C: I have given this a lot of thought, and my favorite letter is the minuscule G. Have you. Have you seen the letter G?
Like the old school minuscule G that kind of looks like a T with an S tail underneath it.
[00:39:18] Speaker B: So it's got a T at the top.
[00:39:20] Speaker C: It's got the top bar of the T. Yeah. And then about halfway through that bar, there's an S curve tail that comes out of it.
So T with a squiggly vertical stroke.
And I. I like this letter because I'm curious about why does it look like that and how. How. How come it's so different from the G that we do now?
And I'm still doing research on it just for my own pleasure, and I'm still trying to really understand. And so I've. I know. I wish I could show you.
[00:40:01] Speaker B: Oh, my God. I'm fascinated. I did not expect this question to go down this.
This route.
[00:40:07] Speaker C: What I found is that there are two ways that this. This G came about. For the G sound, they used to use a letter C.
And the letter C, they just added a little.
A little line at the bottom to distinguish it from a. You know, to turn it from a C to a G.
And so in calligraphy, letters change because of the way. Of the way that they're written. Sometimes they get lost in translation. Sometimes like. Like if I was trying to copy something that you wrote, but I didn't know exactly how you did it, I might do it in a different way and it might turn out different. But oftentimes what happens in calligraphy is that a letter starts out in one way, usually in the likeness of some other already existing letter. In this case, it started out as a C. And if I was writing this letter really fast, you know, instead of taking my time and writing a C and then writing the bottom stroke and then going back to the top, what if I wrote the top first and then, you know, because I don't know the ductus, because maybe I'm not the scribe. I'm not sitting with you asking, so how do you make this letter? And so instead, I do it in a different order, and then I also write it at a different speed, and I kind of maybe fuse the strokes together and it becomes something different.
You know, back then, scribes were copying other scribes, you know, or if I went to France, let's say, and I bought a souvenir from somewhere and it had something written on it, I brought it back to England or I brought it back to America, and then we tried to kind of assimilate it into our Alphabet, you know, it might become different from how it was intended by the scribe, because we're not there with the scribe, and we can't ask him questions. And then if you look at, like, the Merovingian scripts, and you see. You see that liturgy where it's a straight line at the bottom at the top, and then it's a squiggle S curve underneath, but then there are ligatures. The Merovingian style was fusing letters together left and right. I mean, that letter G took two forms, and when it was not ligatured, it was just straight with a squiggle. And when it was ligatured, the top bar made like, a loop at the top and then went downward to connect to letter I or to letter R. And that loop at the top became counter, counter space.
[00:42:30] Speaker B: My goodness.
[00:42:31] Speaker C: And then after. After the Merovingian style, you had the Carolingian style which came after it. And so imagine that you're.
You're the scribe responsible for creating or for developing Carolingian. You're like, okay, I need a G. And the Alphabet that came before you, or that was. That you were surrounded with, was a Merovingian one. And you had to just pick one. You can't have two GS, because you're trying to create something new, and you don't want to have too many variat because you want something that was very legible. And so I imagine that the person responsible for developing Carolingian was like, I think I'm going to pick this one here with the counter space, because that one looks too much like a teen. I don't want to confuse people I'm just. I'm just, you know, putting my plate myself in the place of that Skype who had to pick.
So in the Carolingian one, you have the closed G, the one that has an oval at the top and then has a squiggle, which is sometimes open. And anyway, I'm digressing, but that is why I love the G. And I'm still actually, I don't have an answer. I don't actually really know why. These are just things that I've speculated or read about. And I'm just fascinated by this one letter because it's. It's so different from how it started and how it ended up. And why is it sometimes that we have only one counter, close counter, and why we. Why do we have two? Or what's the ear about? Why does it have an ear?
[00:43:59] Speaker B: Yeah, why? I know, right? I know we need to go on a whole adventure, go through the Alphabet. I mean, that is another massive topic that we could go into. But I just, I love that. I absolutely love that you already have a letter that you're fascinated with. And that wasn't a complete surprise question that you had to sit there thinking about.
Oh, it's been so lovely talking to you, Nina. I mean, there's lots and lots of things that have been mentioned today and I want to make sure I collect all the little things that you might have referenced throughout our conversation. I'll make sure we put them in the show notes and if there are visuals, especially for the letter G, I can link to any images. So we will do that as well. But to find out more about Nina, if anybody is interested, you could go to her website.
I want to say a Nin tran or annintran.com. is that how you say it? Or you can find her on Instagram as well. So, Nin Tran. And as always, we'll put this in, in the details in the show notes. But thank you so much for talking to me today for sharing your story, your journey and just being a complete inspiration to so many people, including myself and, yeah, teaching these beautiful scripts and continuing to do so. So thank you so much for coming on.
[00:45:21] Speaker C: Thank you, Laura. Thank you so much for having me.
[00:45:24] Speaker B: Oh, thank you.
[00:45:27] Speaker A: Thanks so much for listening. This series would not be possible without my producer, Heidi Cullip, and kindly supported by Speedball Art, champions of creativity, connection and craftsmanship. If you've enjoyed the episode episode, don't forget to subscribe, leave a review or share it with a fellow letter lover. Until next time, keep listening, keep creating and keep celebrating the life of letters.
