Inking and Printing

Inking and printing was a hands-on activity that was so much fun.  Most of time I ended up doing the inking, which was interesting.  In order to get all of the letters sufficiently covered in ink, one must roll the roller over each section in a plethora of directions about a trillion times.  And then there's always that one corner at the very edge of the page that is lighter than the rest, because apparently in the Great Inking of the Letters, that one section was stubborn and refused to succumb to the great powers of my inking roller.

I also enjoyed the experience of making sure the words got onto the paper through the wonderful art of printing.  It's pretty interesting to learn that some people were so fast with those archaic machines at some point.  The swinging must have been intense, because I wasn't moving that quickly and the printer swayed whenever I pulled the bar to clamp the print down onto the paper.  However, I really enjoyed that part, and felt that if I were working in a book-making factory back in the Golden Ages, I should not so much mind just swinging from that bar clamp all day.  It took me leaning with all my weight to make sure everything was pressed down sufficiently.  So I could pretend that I was on a ship or something and it was swaying back and forth, and I was just holding onto the railing.  It's a highly metaphorical image, but if I was to do the same monotonous motion all day, I would attempt to add some creativity to an otherwise easily worn-out task.

The similarity between the two machines is striking.  Anyway, I very thoroughly enjoyed the overall process, and it is something I should be glad to have a chance to do again sometime in the future!