You’ll need to be sharpish to listen to this as Ampers-Fan, a BBC Radio 4 Ampersand Documentary by Alistair Sooke, is of a highly time sensitive nature and will expire in 5 days from the date of this post.

If you have half an hour whilst working then I recommend listing to this delightful documentary charting, “…the dark horse of the keyboard, the ampersand exists to join things together, yet remains set apart.”

Alistair Sooke traces the history of the funny little character that has quietly given joy to so many, from a bored medieval scribe right the way through to a modern day digital font designer.

Delighting type designers throughout the centuries as a chance within a font to create a small piece of art, it is a joyful moment in a functional resource.

Speaking to Ampersfans Alastair enters into a world of letterpress, punchcutting and typography and discovers how the ampersand can be found at every step of the way, bringing a joyful flick of a tail to the dullest document.

K Found on http://www.bbc.co.uk