Craig Dworkin : Dure

Although Dure is not, strictly speaking, composed according to Oulipo constraints, it does observe Jacques Roubaud’s rule that “A text written according to a constraint describes the constraint.” For the source texts, listed in a chronological table at the back of the book and ranging from the OED to Derrida and Wittgenstein, Smithson and Kosuth, Aristotle and Augustine, obscure Renaissance medical text and the notes of various rare book dealers, are chosen with an eye to illustrating, in however various ways, the meaning and resonance of the title: Dure, from durus (Latin for “hard”), referring both to the enigmatic art of Dürer as well as to the English derivates of durus like duration, durable, and endure.

— Majorie Perloff

The typeface is Dyrynk, designed in 1929 by the Czech book artist Karel Dyrynk, and first issued in digital form by Richard Kegler at p22. Printed offset and perfectbound.

Edition of 200. (2004)