SourceType’s Dictionary of the Illegible explores what happens when typography stops making sense

It’s Nice That (INT): Let’s cut straight to the chase: is language dead?

Laurenz Brunner (LB): I don’t think so. But language is becoming increasingly political. It is used as propaganda, polluted by misinformation, generated by bots and increasingly distorted by algorithms designed to capture attention rather than create understanding.

At the same time, social media paradoxically disconnects us from one another, as we become more isolated within a hyper-individualised, self-optimising society. Genuine human connection and interaction therefore become vitally important. Language remains fundamental to this – not simply as a means of speaking, but as a way of listening to and understanding one another, exchanging ideas and creating intimacy.

INT: If illegibility isn’t a breakdown of communication, but rather a unique cultural condition (or an evolution of traditional, legible communication) how do you differentiate between something that is simply “bad typography” and something that is meaningfully “illegible”? (Is there such a thing as bad typography?)

LB: I think the beauty of abstraction lies in the space it opens up for interpretation by the reader. In that sense, I’m hesitant to make a distinction between “good” and “bad” typography. What might appear dysfunctional or incorrect in one context can become meaningful in another. Unlike art, which has fully embraced abstraction as an evocative and powerful form of expression, traditional writing has largely remained tied to narrative and semantic logic. My research looks for examples that challenge this convention and illustrates that language can be equally free.

INT: The title of the book is slightly tongue-in-cheek; a dictionary implies legible orders and definitions. So how did you go about creating a taxonomy of eccentric texts that defy simple categorisation?

LB: A lot of the material in the book hovers somewhere between image and text, so it felt important to present it within a legible system while leaving the content itself completely open to interpretation. During the process, I explored organising the material chronologically, as well as building chapters around different themes, but both felt too prescriptive. In the end, imposing the rigid order of the alphabet allowed the content to fall into a strangely non-linear sequence, creating unexpected juxtapositions and connections along the way. In that spirit, Dictionary of the Illegible is a productive paradox – an attempt to make meaning from content that inherently resists it.

INT: What is the connective tissue between a 16th-century engraving by Albrecht Dürer and a cryptic screen capture from Family Guy, or metal core band logos and Miffy? How do they speak the same “illegible” language?

LB: The connective tissue is perhaps less visual than conceptual. I’m interested in illegibility as something that continually reappears across completely different cultures, periods and contexts. A 16th-century engraving and a Family Guy screen capture may have almost nothing in common historically or aesthetically, yet both can occupy that strange territory where language becomes something more than information. Putting these things next to each other temporarily removes their usual hierarchies and contexts. Suddenly Dürer can speak to a metalcore band, or Miffy to an ancient inscription. The book is interested in precisely these unlikely connections – and in the fundamentally human impulse to encode, obscure and transform.

INT: What is the ultimate lesson a graphic designer can take away from this book? How does teaching people to read the unreadable expand our visual and media literacy?

LB: David Carson once said, “Don’t mistake legibility for communication”. That idea still resonates with me, because it encourages us to think about communication more holistically. Good communication doesn’t always have to be immediate, clear or efficient. It can be ambiguous, slow or obscure. In a hyper-accelerated world, there can be real value in language that slows us down, demands our attention and asks something of the reader rather than simply transferring information. Precisely because we have to engage with it, it can reach us in a more emotional, intuitive or even visceral way.

INT: What’s your favourite form of “illegible” text?

LB: There isn’t a single example for me, but rather a larger phenomenon that became increasingly dear to me as the project developed: the way illegibility can protect knowledge. Across different cultures and periods, obscurity, codes and restricted forms of writing have been used to keep certain knowledge within a community – whether among minorities, subcultures or the occult. I find something beautiful in the idea that not everything is meant to be universally understood or made accessible. In that sense, illegibility can create a healthy boundary: it can conceal and protect, but also create intimacy and belonging among those who know how to read it.