ABC.

• Author: Fernando Verissimo, Luis
• Position: Letters in the alphabet - Latitudes

When we first learn to read, the letters are huge. The ones in the first-grade readers were enormous. The A was like a big tent, and the B--with its bulging bosom and even bigger belly--was larger still. The C, always ready to bite the letter that followed, the pompous-looking D. All the way to the Z, which forever seemed to be looking back to make sure it really was the last letter in the alphabet.

The letters were large, of course, so we could memorize their shape. But they didn't have to be that big. If I recall rightly, my vision at the time was 20/20. It hasn't been that good since. Anyway, children's books had these whopping big letters and lots of space between the lines. And the words were short, so you wouldn't strain your eyes.

As we grew older, the letters got smaller, and the words got longer. Just about the time we no longer have a child's keen vision, we start our serious reading--newspapers, for example, with their tiny print and tightly packed lines--where sharp eyes are really needed. By the time we begin to peer more closely at such things as footnotes, the leaflets enclosed with over-the-counter medicines, and the fine print in contracts, that perfect eyesight of our childhood--which we squandered on Peanuts and Dennis the Menace--is more than half gone.

Just when we're old enough to be reading bulky tomes in six-point type, our eyes are only fit for the humongous brightly-colored letters, surrounded by lots of white space, found in children's books. The weaker our eyes become, the more we demand of them. Some of us reach for a magnifying glass to break those long-winded adult words down into the manageable monosyllables of childhood. And to restore the letters' unique personality...