In Typography Line length is the width occupied by a block of typeset text, measured in inches, picas and points. A block of text or paragraph has a maximum line length that fits a determined design.
Line length is determined by typographic parameters based on a formal grid and template with several goals in mind; balance and function for fit and readability with a sensitivity to aesthetic style in typography. Typographers adjust line length to aid legibility or copy fit. Text can be flush left and ragged right, flush right and ragged left, or justified where all lines are of equal length. In a ragged right setting line lengths vary to create a ragged right edge of lines varying in length. Sometimes this can be visually satisfying. For justified and ragged right settings typographers can adjust line length to avoid unwanted hyphens, rivers of white space, and orphaned words/characters at the end of lines (e.g.: "The", "I", "He", "We").
Famous quotes containing the words line and/or length:
“It may be the more
That no line of her writing have I,
Nor a thread of her hair,
No mark of her late time as dame in her dwelling, whereby
I may picture her there.”
—Thomas Hardy (1840–1928)
“It was inspiriting to hear the regular dip of the paddles, as if they were our fins or flippers, and to realize that we were at length fairly embarked. We who had felt strangely as stage-passengers and tavern-lodgers were suddenly naturalized there and presented with the freedom of the lakes and woods.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)