Meet the Artist: John Langdon

John Langdon got the inspiration for his first ambigram design late one night after his wife was asleep. Armed with a cold beer, a new pad of paper, a new pencil, a fresh pack of Marlboros and his favorite Electric Light Orchestra album playing in the background, he was feeling good and wrote the word “Heaven” on the page.  After writing the word he suddenly realized that he could make it read the same way upside-down, launching him on a decades-long journey into a previously unknown art form.

The year was 1972, and Langdon would continue to practice his craft for decades, becoming widely regarded as one of the two co-inventors of modern ambigrams.   However, his was a lonely craft, with only a small demand for his unique designs.

That all began to change in 1999 when author Dan Brown contacted Langdon to produce some enigmatic and mysterious symbols for his second book entitled “Angels & Demons“.

Now that the book is becoming a Hollywood blockbuster starring Tom Hanks and directed by Ron Howard, we caught up with Langdon to discuss his contributions to the Angels and Demons phenomenon.

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Ambigram.com: “Thanks for taking some time to talk with us during the exciting month of the movie release of Angels and Demons, John.  Did you have any idea that Angels and Demons would become such a big hit?”

John Langdon: “I don’t think that anyone really expected [Angels and Demons] to become as big as it did. Keep in mind that when Dan Brown wrote “Angels and Demons“, he wasn’t the bestselling author that he is today.  He was just a guy who had recently fallen in love with my ambigrams, and a struggling author who was writing a book, and needed some illustrations to go along with the plot.”

Ambigram.com: “Yes, but you contributed more than just the designs for the book.  Our understanding is that the character gets many of his quirks, his interests, and his surname from you.”

John Langdon: “That’s true.  I need to know a lot about universal symbols to be successful at designing logos, and Robert Langdon shares that love of symbols.  The character is also knowledgeable regarding things like word origins and etymologies, which is another field that is quite close to my heart.  His phobias regarding heights and water are similar to quirks of mine. However, seeing Robert Langdon in the Da Vinci Code, I was surprised at how much better looking he is than I am.”

“After Dan had written much of the book, he called to tell me that he had decided to name the main character after me. He never did tell me why, but I just assumed it was a way of thanking me for the ambigrams.”

Ambigram.com: “Let’s talk about the ambigrams for Angels & Demons in a little more detail.  Between the book contents and the cover, we counted seven ambigrams total, and they became the first exposure that most people have ever had with ambigrams.  In fact, in our own list of the Top Ten Most Famous Ambigrams, fully half of the spots are filled with your ambigrams from Angels and Demons.”

John Langdon: “Yes, I saw that.”

Ambigram.com: “What was the trickiest part of designing those particular ambigrams?”

John Langdon: “Honestly, Earth, Air, Fire and Water were not particularly hard words to turn into ambigrams.  Getting them to all have a similar look was a bit trickier, but the Gothic Blackletter style is the most cooperative and forgiving letter style for ambigrams, so it was fortunate that the Blackletter style fit Dan’s needs so well.”

Earth	Air
Fire	Water

“The Illuminati ambigram was harder, as it has a lot of similar shapes that repeat frequently, and not enough individuation of letter shapes.  I tried to tell Dan that the Illuminati ambigram wasn’t going to work, but as it turned out, I was wrong.”

Ambigram.com: “In addition to the designs you’ve done for Dan Brown, you authored a book filled with ambigram designs and methodology called “Wordplay“, which was released in its second edition in 2005.  Any advice for someone considering reading this book?”

John Langdon: “No one should read it unless they are prepared to be challenged on their assumptions about themselves, other people and the universe around us, as well as entertained and occasionally amazed in the process.”

Ambigram.com: “Thank you, John.  We appreciate your time.”

John Langdon: “My pleasure.”