John Langdon (website | wikipedia) passed away a few days ago, on January 1, 2026. He was one of the pioneers of ambigrams: words designed to be read from multiple orientations, most commonly upside down. We never met. There were opportunities but somehow it never worked out. And that is a regret I will carry.

I was first introduced to ambigrams through Douglas Hofstadter’s books: first Godel Escher Bach and then Metamagical Themas. Hofstadter, in fact, coined the term “ambigram” for this art form that three people (Scott Kim, John Langdon, and Robert Petrick) had independently invented (or should it be discovered?), around the same time. Through Hofstadter I came across Scott Kim’s book Inversions when I was doing my Masters in Design at IDC, IIT Bombay. I was impressed by these clever designs, but, at that time, it never crossed my mind that I could create anything similar.

Many years later, sitting in a stats class in Urbana-Champaign, now studying for my doctorate, I created my first reflection ambigram, for my friend Chris. I remember printing it out and putting it up in the research lab. My friend Brian, our tech-guy, said that this was a one-off and I could not create one for his name. Challenge accepted and a few hours later I had created a rotational ambigram for Brian. There was no stopping me after that.

The first two ambigrams I ever created.
A reflection ambigram for “Chris” and a rotational design for “Brian”.

When the world wide web became a thing I created one of the first websites with original ambigram designs (hosted on a now defunct website called flip-flop.com). One day I received an email from Scott Kim, praising my work. And through that I got a chance to meet my childhood intellectual hero, Douglas Hofstadter.

That said, I shudder when I look back at my early designs. They were terrible. But I stuck with it and over the next few years created hundreds of designs, some better than others.

Around that time, I went to Boston for an internship at BBN. I was staying with my friend Sonit Bafna, then a student at MIT, who knew of my dabbling with ambigrams. He gave me a copy of John Langdon’s book Wordplay. This book, a copy of which I still have with me today, blew me away. Here was someone who understood that this wasn’t mere visual trickery. It was art. It was philosophy made visible. John took ambigrams to the next level.

John showed me that ambigrams could embody meaning, not just demonstrate cleverness. His Taoist sensibility, the interplay of opposites, the unity beneath apparent duality, infused every letterform. But most importantly his designs were elegant and beautiful. They never felt forced, as many of my designs did. His work inspired me to work harder, since I now knew what could be possible and how much I still had to learn.

Countless ambigram artists, myself included, found permission in his work to take this strange craft seriously. John was also incredibly generous with his gift. We communicated by email. He would drop a note if he liked a particular design I had created or offer suggestions to improve a design.

He also influenced my life in a more unexpected way. Years before, John had created a set of ambigrams (for the words: earth, fire, water, and air) for an unknown author’s book, Angels & Demons. Many years later, another book by that author blew up and became one of the all-time blockbuster bestsellers. The author was Dan Brown; the book, The Da Vinci Code.

Around this time, I started receiving a barrage of emails (often 5-10 a week) from strangers requesting I create ambigrams for them. I couldn’t understand why I had become so popular until I read a New York Times story about readers going back to purchase Dan Brown’s previous books, including Angels & Demons. Millions encountered ambigrams through that novel, and since my ambigram pages had been online for years, I landed high in Google’s search results. My little brush with internet celebrity, albeit of a niche kind, was all due to John!

Incidentally, Dan Brown named his protagonist, Robert Langdon, after John. In the movies, Robert Langdon was played by Tom Hanks, something that I am sure delighted him.

A new rotational ambigram created in homage to John Langdon

Over the years, as my ambigram work improved, I was honored to appear alongside John’s work in a few books, such as Brad Honeycutt’s The Art of Deception: John’s designs on one page, mine on the next. He also served as a judge for Nikita Prokhorov’s book Ambigrams Revealed and selected some of my pieces for inclusion. These recognitions never made it to my academic CV—but were (and still are) deeply meaningful to me. (A few examples are given at the end of this post.)

John and I exchanged messages over the years. He was unfailingly kind, encouraging, curious about what others were creating. Sharply critical if a particular design did not meet his standards. But always available, encouraging, and helpful.

This is the third post I have written in the past 6 months or so about people who I have never met and yet have deeply influenced me. The first was Bill Atkinson, the creator of Hypercard. The next was Tom Soppard the playwright, and now John. Well at least John knew of my existence, but the fact remains that we never sat down together, despite an open invitation. And I regret that.

Thank you, John, for showing us that words can hold more than one truth at once.

BTW, the first ambigram he ever made, back in 1972, was for the word HEAVEN. Make of it what you will.

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Some of the books which included my designs along with those created by John

Two pages, one following the other. The first page with 2 designs by John, and my “good-evil” design.