Recorded during TypeCon2014: Capitolized in Washington, DC
Turkenich presents a great oddity in the history of Hebrew type design — the Schoenfieldian script — suggested in the 1930s as a reformed version of the existing Hebrew. Arguing that the Hebrew script is inadequate and contains an “unsavoury mess of ugly letters”, the new Hebrew was intended to provide a solution suitable for modern times and the Jewish social revolution. The script was constructed from Latin letter parts with additions of lower case and italics in the style of Bodoni or Caslon, only slightly resembling the original Hebrew characters. This suggestion was never approved but triggered issues of delicate definitions of progression vs. abolishment to arise.
Throughout the years other solutions were suggested in order to solve Hebrew difficulties. The Karmeli script, designed in the 50s, was a Latin script with additional characters, meant for writing Hebrew. This idea went as far as specimens printed by Monotype and discussions about its possibility. These stories, although being just anecdotes in the history of Hebrew type bring up the everlasting relevant topic of assimilation with Latin and relate to global trends of Latinisation among non-Latins.
