Braille Poem (Typewriter)
Constructed by manipulating the impressions from the stop (period) key of my typewriter; I noticed this mark left a distinct impression on the reverse of my paper, which reminded me of the raised dots used for Braille.
I then wrote and encoded a short poem into Braille, using some simple contractions to shorten some of the lines (for instance a single character can replace 'th' or 'er', speeding up the process of reading/writing.) "those hungry minds
that long to know
those faceless words
through fingers flow"
To achieve this I had to work in reverse, typing everything on the back of the paper, backwards. I reversed each individual character and the order of the letters, then typed one line of points at a time; the result, when the paper is flipped, is legible Braille.
Braille typewriters do exist (someone buy me one?) - but I thought it an interesting challenge to use my existing machine to create a piece that would work with only the tools I have, and as an exploration of what's possible with the typewriter. This piece coincides with National Braille Week.
