softness for the brain

while i was reading a book with lectures and articles by wim crouwel ‘ways of thinking’ i thought about the absence of capitals in japanese writing.

in the beginning of the 20th century in europe we had an interesting discussion about the use of lower case and capitals. designers wanted to give expression to the utopian ideal of equality, capitals meant traditional hierarchy.
the other source was functional-rational. bauhaus wrote: ‘wir schreiben alles klein, denn wir sparen damit zeit’.

but also visually i prefer as less capitals as possible in a text. mostly i don’t use capitals in e-mails, that allows for wandering and avoids jumping.
this softness for the eye (and brain) is perfectly understood by japanese typography.