Writing tools
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"It is a great advance in civilization to be able to describe the common facts of life, and perhaps, if we were to examine it, we should find that it was at least an equal advance to wish to describe them."
—Walter Bagehot, Physics and Politics. 1872, p. 212.
Photo courtesy Estar Hyo Gyung Choi
The information here on the website is the very briefest of overviews. My book, This Victorian Life, goes into far more detail on writing, pens, and communications parallels between the Victorian era and the 21st-century. Happy reading!
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For drafting manuscripts and writing in my diary, I use my mother of pearl fountain pen when I'm sitting at my desk, a pencil when I sit in my rocking chair or elsewhere.
(I don't mind dripping ink on my hands or felted desktop, but I don't want to get any on my lap or on the furniture!)
(I don't mind dripping ink on my hands or felted desktop, but I don't want to get any on my lap or on the furniture!)
Photo courtesy Estar Hyo Gyung Choi
My mother of pearl fountain pen, circa 1900. I bought this pen with a portion of the advance from selling my first book. Mostly the money I earn from my books goes towards humdrum things like groceries, but with the very first check for one of them I felt it was important to mark a milestone in reaching my childhood dream of becoming a real writer. The pen has been a worthy investment: like so many things in our life it's practical as well as symbolic.
Photo courtesy Estar Hyo Gyung Choi
There are a variety of different styles of fountain pen; mine is a particularly early type which is filled with an eye-dropper instead of using cartridges or vacuuming up the ink itself.
Manuscript pages from my Tales of Chetzemoka series.
Be sure to check out the books!
First Wheel in Town
Love Will Find A Wheel
A Rapping At The Door
Delivery Delayed
There have been some really interesting studies done into the effects of writing vs. typing in memory as well as production:
"Recall mode and recency in immediate serial recall: Computer users beware!" Catherine G. Penney and Penny Ann Blackwood Bulletin of the Psychonomic Society 1989, 27 (6) 545-547.
"Performance amplification and process restructuring in computer-based writing" by Ronald T. Kellogg and Suzanne Mueller International Journal of Man-Machine Studies. 1993. pp. 33-49.
"Influence of Typing Skill on Pause-Execution Cycles in Written Composition." Rui Alexandre Alves, Sao Luis Castro, Liliana de Sousa and Sven Stromqvist. Writing and Cognition: Research and Application (Studies in Writing. Vol. 20, pp. 55-65). Amsterdam: Elsevier.
"A Learning Secret: Don't Take Notes with a Laptop" Cindi May. Scientific American. June 3, 2014. Permanent Address: http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/a-learning-secret-don-t-take-notes-with-a-laptop/
"Fix, then, this in your mind as the guiding principal of all right and practical labor, and source of all healthful life energy—that your art is to be the praise of something that you love. It may only be the praise of a shell or a stone; it may be the praise of a hero; it may be the praise of God; your rank as a living creature is determined by the height and breadth of your love; but, be you small or great, what healthy art is possible to you must be the expression of your true delight in a real thing, better than the art."
—John Ruskin. Pearls for Young Ladies, 1878.
Clockwise from left: violet-scented blue ink (for personal letters), black ink (for formal letters), mother-of-pearl straight pen circa 1890, traveling inkwell, circa 1890.
My handwriting
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My desk: Circa 1910's.
An antique passed down from Gabriel's maternal grandmother, Catherine Petersen
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An antique passed down from Gabriel's maternal grandmother, Catherine Petersen
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When I take notes on texts in antique books or volumes which are otherwise irreplaceable, I use a pencil to avoid the possibility of getting ink on the pages.
I also use a pencil for taking notes and jotting down my thoughts when I'm out and about, because my fountain pen doesn't travel well. (It leaks badly if it's jostled around too much.)
For book signing events, I have a newer cartridge-style fountain pen. It's less prone to leakage than the pen I use at home, but slightly less period-appropriate than my eyedropper pen or pencils.
America is sort of an anamoly in that fountain pens are relatively rare here: they are quite common in Europe and Japan. In fact, fountain pens are experiencing a resurgence worldwide.
For more on this, see Brocklehurst, Steve. “Why Are Fountain Pen Sales Rising?” BBC News Magazine. www.bbc.com/ news/magazine-18071830
Books as Time Machines: An essay
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For words of wit and advice sage,
I hope you'll like my author page!
History lessons, folks who dare,
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My books!
This Victorian Life
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In a seaport town in the late 19th-century Pacific Northwest, a group of friends find themselves drawn together —by chance, by love, and by the marvelous changes their world is undergoing. In the process, they learn that the family we choose can be just as important as the ones we're born into. Join their adventures in
The Tales of Chetzemoka
A Trip and a Tumble:
A Victorian Cycling Club Story
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Anthologies
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Articles I've written:
"What Millenial Women Can Learn From Victorian Ladies"
On Refinery29
Everyday Life As A Learning Experience:
www.commonlit.org/texts/everyday-life-as-a-learning-experience
Getting Intimate With History:
https://vintorian.blogspot.ca/2015/12/getting-intimate-with-history-lessons.html
Costumes vs. Clothing: An excerpt from Victorian Secrets:
http://www.thisvictorianlife.com/costume-vs-clothing.html
Curating history:
http://www.thisvictorianlife.com/blog/curating-history
The difference between digitization and preservation:
http://www.thisvictorianlife.com/blog/digitization-does-not-equal-preservation
Daily Challenges:
http://www.thisvictorianlife.com/blog/-daily-challenges-perverts-at-purple-haze-fire-to-temper-steel
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