The Typewriter Blues

Does form dictate content?

Quills to fountain pens to typewriters to electric typewriters to word processors to laptops.

The writing instrument must affect how we think and write.

I can't imagine writing on a manual typewriter. Or-- let me rephrase that-- I can't imagine editing on a typewriter. My process is so fluid, that dancing cursor at the end of each word  pulses and guides like a wee fairy. Tinkerbell!

Some writers I know write in longhand, then type up their manuscript on a computer.

I take notes by hand sometimes-- but I usually have trouble reading my own handwriting.
Penmanship was never my thang, ya'll.

I wonder what and how we'll be writing 20 years from now. It boggles the noodle.

This is a picture of my grandmother's 1940-something Smith Corona manual typewriter. It is in pristine condition, as is the owner's manual. Alas, the ribbon is not. No ribbons anymore to buy and replace it. The typewriter, itself, can fetch a princely sum on Ebay.

So, for Christmas she got an electric typewriter. Yeah, I know. I didn't think they made electric typewriters either. But they do.

I spent the afternoon trying to figure the #$@! thing out...so my grandmother could type her recipes and lists and sympathy notes. When you get 85, you write a lot of Sorry for Your Loss messages.

So we did figure it out finally...[that's her, in a practice run] It's  more complicated to use--with all its codes and keys-- than a computer, and I told her so.

She said she was too old to learn anyhing knew.