4 ms·

I know your comment is in earnest and I don't mean to make fun of you, but there is something so funny in our Americanised world where everything is reduced to

by sph 2y ago

I know your comment is in earnest and I don't mean to make fun of you, but there is something so funny in our Americanised world where everything is reduced to "it's not you, you just need to buy the correct gizmo that will solve all your problems." Fountain pens enthusiasts are like music gear or mechanical keyboard enthusiasts, that justify their hobby and believe spending on the next shiny thing is the key to fulfil their whatever, until the next shiny thing arrives. The thing is... if one dislikes or doesn't care about writing that they have basically forgotten how to, it is not spending money on a fancy writing implement that is gonna turn them into a medieval monk scribe.

Woeps 2y ago
> The thing is... if one dislikes or doesn't care about writing that they have basically forgotten how to, it is not spending money on a fancy writing implement that is gonna turn them into a medieval monk scribe. The thing is, it does actually... Because it "forces" you to slow down and take time for it. I hated writing (heavily dyslexic) but after getting a fountainpen and purposely slowing down I noticed it went better. Now I write in my own language again, I spend whole evenings writing scenes, essays, debates and letters. Sometimes it is the tool that forces a bit of change (if you want to change of course).
TeMPOraL 2y ago
> but there is something so funny in our Americanised world where everything is reduced to "it's not you, you just need to buy the correct gizmo that will solve all your problems." OTOH, it's an improvement over the other world of solving everything through "discipline" and other kinds of wishful thinking. Like, you can complain and worry that your kid can't seem to learn how to cut things right with their scissors, try to force some discipline and conscientiousness into them - or you can stop causing them and yourself so much grief and realize that a left-handed person needs left-handed scissors, as using the wrong type for your hand works to prevent the cutting action.
- znpy 2y ago
  > OTOH, it's an improvement over the other world of solving everything through "discipline" and other kinds of wishful thinking. kinda, the truth is somewhere in between in my opinion. most things related to our body movement do require training to be mastered. I think that writing is no different endeavur. It's just that fountain pens can make it more pleasant.
tiborsaas 2y ago
Having a good pen really helps a lot with writing. I'm not a fountain pen enthusiast, I don't even have one. I just noticed that there's a huge difference between a ballpoint pen and a "rolling ballpoint pen". The naming is confusing, since the ballpoint pen should also be "rolling", but whatever.
- devilbunny 2y ago
  Ballpoint pens use a viscous ink that, like graphite in a pencil, needs pressure to be applied. Rollerballs and fountain pens both use low-viscosity inks that flow simply from being touched to the paper. The latter requires much less effort to write (no constant pressure) and enables writing with the hand held mostly still, using the larger muscles of the upper arm and shoulder to create the letters. The downside is that they can create impressively large ink blots on your clothing if uncapped/unretracted, and the ink can be smeared if you touch it while wet. But pretty much every writing system still out there in use (i.e., not cuneiform or runes) was designed with a quill or brush as the instrument.
  - sph 2y ago
    > But pretty much every writing system still out there in use (i.e., not cuneiform or runes) was designed with a quill or brush as the instrument. That's if you know cursive. I don't think the standard small-case script most people use in their everyday life is quill-friendly.
    - devilbunny 2y ago
      Your style might have to change a bit, but disconnected letters were quite common in medieval Roman-style scripts, which were definitely written with quills.
  - tiborsaas 2y ago
    > that flow simply from being touched to the paper Or just by itself if you bring it with you on a plane :) This looks like a perfect rabbit hole I'd be wise to avoid. At least I have a good excuse of being left handed since I would be constantly smearing all the wet ink.
cbm-vic-20 2y ago
> Fountain pens enthusiasts are like music gear or mechanical keyboard enthusiasts There is a subreddit /r/mechanicalheadpens for these three specific interests.
Symbiote 2y ago
The recommendation was to try a $5-15 pen. That's a long way from what you're describing. It's exactly what millions of schoolchildren are required to use when they're learning to write.
- sph 2y ago
  Sure, but billions of people can write just fine with a $0.50 ballpoint pen. Also, it's not $25 or $2,500 that will stop you from doing 95% of your writing on a physical and smartphone keyboard because that's how society works nowadays. This comment cannot be written with a fountain pen, nor my work emails or communication with friends and relatives. Many people can't write any more simply because they don't really have to.
kstrauser 2y ago
A LAMY Safari with its triangle grip vastly improved my handwriting by forcing me to use a different grip than I’d naturally use. So yes, for me, the correct cheap gizmo solved all my problems.
- bluGill 2y ago
  I've played with different miracle gizmos all my life, nothing worked. When I go slow and careful I can write like a 2nd grader. As a kid my teachers were constantly mad at me until one realized I was trying and got me testing - sadly dysgraphia (likely the diagnosis I needed, though I was never formally diagnosed) wouldn't exist for several more years and so I couldn't get the right help. (if any help exists, I haven't been able to find anything useful and I'm not sure as an adult if it is worth the time - there are so many other things I can do instead)
  - kstrauser 2y ago
    To be clear, the Safari showed me that I can write without loathing the process. I feel I've given it a fair shot, though, and I'm back to typing everything instead. I'll use a paper and a pen to jot quick notes during a meeting or something but that's the extent of it. Turns out I can get by just fine with hardly ever handwriting anything. The only people disappointed by this are my elementary school teachers who had insisted this was something I needed to care about.
graemep 2y ago
I definitely write better with some pens than with others, and probably best with fountain pens (I have lost my best fountain pen though). Its not going to make me write like a scribe creating an illuminated manuscript, but there is an awful lot of room for "better" between that and my usual handwriting with a cheap ball point.
fatbird 2y ago
It would be more charitable to say that the change forced upon yourself by changing your instrument is a straightforward way of making you mindful of what you're doing and make it easier to break bad habits. Yes, you can break bad habits by not doing them with the same tools, but the objective is to change your behaviour, not to demonstrate personal Calvinism.
znpy 2y ago
> but there is something so funny in our Americanised world where everything is reduced to "it's not you, you just need to buy the correct gizmo that will solve all your problems." Sigh... I'm not american and i don't live in the US. > Fountain pens enthusiasts are like music gear or mechanical keyboard enthusiasts, that justify their hobby and believe spending on the next shiny thing is the key to fulfil their whatever, until the next shiny thing arrives. Yep, I'm aware, that's why i was explicit on the fact that a ~20$ Pelikan Jazz is just great and "getting into fountain pens" is something that you can definitely avoid (I do avoid it, as a matter of fact). > The thing is... if one dislikes or doesn't care about writing that they have basically forgotten how to, it is not spending money on a fancy writing implement that is gonna turn them into a medieval monk scribe. you do you i guess. good luck.
BeetleB 2y ago
I get where you're coming from, but, given that I own several pens, and my handwriting really differs depending on which pen I'm using, I would say he has a point. Changing the pen you use (even within ballpoints) can significantly impact your handwriting. In reality, it's a bit more complicated. I've found the following impacts my handwriting: - Grip format on pen (i.e. shape of pen) - Ink I'm using - Paper I'm writing on - Nib - And yes, type of pen (ballpoint vs fountain pen)

by sph 2y ago

Woeps 2y ago

> The thing is... if one dislikes or doesn't care about writing that they have basically forgotten how to, it is not spending money on a fancy writing implement that is gonna turn them into a medieval monk scribe. The thing is, it does actually... Because it "forces" you to slow down and take time for it. I hated writing (heavily dyslexic) but after getting a fountainpen and purposely slowing down I noticed it went better. Now I write in my own language again, I spend whole evenings writing scenes, essays, debates and letters. Sometimes it is the tool that forces a bit of change (if you want to change of course).

TeMPOraL 2y ago

> but there is something so funny in our Americanised world where everything is reduced to "it's not you, you just need to buy the correct gizmo that will solve all your problems." OTOH, it's an improvement over the other world of solving everything through "discipline" and other kinds of wishful thinking. Like, you can complain and worry that your kid can't seem to learn how to cut things right with their scissors, try to force some discipline and conscientiousness into them - or you can stop causing them and yourself so much grief and realize that a left-handed person needs left-handed scissors, as using the wrong type for your hand works to prevent the cutting action.

znpy 2y ago
> OTOH, it's an improvement over the other world of solving everything through "discipline" and other kinds of wishful thinking. kinda, the truth is somewhere in between in my opinion. most things related to our body movement do require training to be mastered. I think that writing is no different endeavur. It's just that fountain pens can make it more pleasant.

tiborsaas 2y ago

Having a good pen really helps a lot with writing. I'm not a fountain pen enthusiast, I don't even have one. I just noticed that there's a huge difference between a ballpoint pen and a "rolling ballpoint pen". The naming is confusing, since the ballpoint pen should also be "rolling", but whatever.

devilbunny 2y ago
Ballpoint pens use a viscous ink that, like graphite in a pencil, needs pressure to be applied. Rollerballs and fountain pens both use low-viscosity inks that flow simply from being touched to the paper. The latter requires much less effort to write (no constant pressure) and enables writing with the hand held mostly still, using the larger muscles of the upper arm and shoulder to create the letters. The downside is that they can create impressively large ink blots on your clothing if uncapped/unretracted, and the ink can be smeared if you touch it while wet. But pretty much every writing system still out there in use (i.e., not cuneiform or runes) was designed with a quill or brush as the instrument.
- sph 2y ago
  > But pretty much every writing system still out there in use (i.e., not cuneiform or runes) was designed with a quill or brush as the instrument. That's if you know cursive. I don't think the standard small-case script most people use in their everyday life is quill-friendly.
  - devilbunny 2y ago
    Your style might have to change a bit, but disconnected letters were quite common in medieval Roman-style scripts, which were definitely written with quills.
- tiborsaas 2y ago
  > that flow simply from being touched to the paper Or just by itself if you bring it with you on a plane :) This looks like a perfect rabbit hole I'd be wise to avoid. At least I have a good excuse of being left handed since I would be constantly smearing all the wet ink.

cbm-vic-20 2y ago

> Fountain pens enthusiasts are like music gear or mechanical keyboard enthusiasts There is a subreddit /r/mechanicalheadpens for these three specific interests.

Symbiote 2y ago

The recommendation was to try a $5-15 pen. That's a long way from what you're describing. It's exactly what millions of schoolchildren are required to use when they're learning to write.

sph 2y ago
Sure, but billions of people can write just fine with a $0.50 ballpoint pen. Also, it's not $25 or $2,500 that will stop you from doing 95% of your writing on a physical and smartphone keyboard because that's how society works nowadays. This comment cannot be written with a fountain pen, nor my work emails or communication with friends and relatives. Many people can't write any more simply because they don't really have to.

kstrauser 2y ago

A LAMY Safari with its triangle grip vastly improved my handwriting by forcing me to use a different grip than I’d naturally use. So yes, for me, the correct cheap gizmo solved all my problems.

bluGill 2y ago
I've played with different miracle gizmos all my life, nothing worked. When I go slow and careful I can write like a 2nd grader. As a kid my teachers were constantly mad at me until one realized I was trying and got me testing - sadly dysgraphia (likely the diagnosis I needed, though I was never formally diagnosed) wouldn't exist for several more years and so I couldn't get the right help. (if any help exists, I haven't been able to find anything useful and I'm not sure as an adult if it is worth the time - there are so many other things I can do instead)
- kstrauser 2y ago
  To be clear, the Safari showed me that I can write without loathing the process. I feel I've given it a fair shot, though, and I'm back to typing everything instead. I'll use a paper and a pen to jot quick notes during a meeting or something but that's the extent of it. Turns out I can get by just fine with hardly ever handwriting anything. The only people disappointed by this are my elementary school teachers who had insisted this was something I needed to care about.

graemep 2y ago

I definitely write better with some pens than with others, and probably best with fountain pens (I have lost my best fountain pen though). Its not going to make me write like a scribe creating an illuminated manuscript, but there is an awful lot of room for "better" between that and my usual handwriting with a cheap ball point.

fatbird 2y ago

It would be more charitable to say that the change forced upon yourself by changing your instrument is a straightforward way of making you mindful of what you're doing and make it easier to break bad habits. Yes, you can break bad habits by not doing them with the same tools, but the objective is to change your behaviour, not to demonstrate personal Calvinism.

znpy 2y ago

> but there is something so funny in our Americanised world where everything is reduced to "it's not you, you just need to buy the correct gizmo that will solve all your problems." Sigh... I'm not american and i don't live in the US. > Fountain pens enthusiasts are like music gear or mechanical keyboard enthusiasts, that justify their hobby and believe spending on the next shiny thing is the key to fulfil their whatever, until the next shiny thing arrives. Yep, I'm aware, that's why i was explicit on the fact that a ~20$ Pelikan Jazz is just great and "getting into fountain pens" is something that you can definitely avoid (I do avoid it, as a matter of fact). > The thing is... if one dislikes or doesn't care about writing that they have basically forgotten how to, it is not spending money on a fancy writing implement that is gonna turn them into a medieval monk scribe. you do you i guess. good luck.

BeetleB 2y ago

I get where you're coming from, but, given that I own several pens, and my handwriting really differs depending on which pen I'm using, I would say he has a point. Changing the pen you use (even within ballpoints) can significantly impact your handwriting. In reality, it's a bit more complicated. I've found the following impacts my handwriting: - Grip format on pen (i.e. shape of pen) - Ink I'm using - Paper I'm writing on - Nib - And yes, type of pen (ballpoint vs fountain pen)