[texhax] Curved text? (was: Diagonal text?)

[Rodolfo Medina]

David Carlisle <d.p.carlisle at gmail.com> writes:

> On 3 February 2016 at 13:26, Rodolfo Medina <rodolfo.medina at gmail.com> wrote:
>> I was wondering if it would be possible and how to produce, in plain TeX,
>> some form of oblique, diagonal text, something like:
>>
>> p
>>  l
>>   a
>>    i
>>     n
>>
>>        T
>>         e
>>          X
>>
>>                                             X
>>                                       e
>>                                 T
>>
>>                         n
>>                   i
>>             a
>>       l
>> p
>>
>>                      X
>>                   e
>>                T
>>
>>             n
>>          i
>>       a
>>    l
>> p
>>
>
> \long\def\x#1{\leavevmode
> \ifx\par#1\par
> \else
> \advance\dimen0 \dimen2
> \lower\dimen0\hbox{#1}%
> \expandafter
> \x
> \fi}
>
>
> \dimen2=5pt\x plain\ TeX
>
> \dimen2=-10pt\x plain\ TeX
>
>
> \bye


It would also be nice to have some forms of `curve' text, i.e. something like:

                        n
                  i           T
              a                    e
           l                          X
         p                              p
        X                                l
         e                               a
           T                            i
                                       n

Possible?  I suppose so, but tricky...

Thanks for any idea,

Rodolfo