I recently had to write the final section of a book. It wasn’t very long — 500 words or so, about half the length of this article — and an imminent train journey seemed the ideal opportunity. No laptop accompanying me, but that didn’t matter: as an exercise in nostalgia I would write the words in longhand. The words, however, refused to appear. The paper stayed defiantly blank. It dawned on me that I can no longer write except on computer.
Virtually every writer I know, or know of, is the same. As so often, technology has first liberated and then enslaved. Fetishisation of the writing process is nothing new — in previous eras inspiration would depend on a particular typewriter, or a certain fountain pen on a certain grade of paper. But both those forms implied a permanence once words had been written. What the computer has introduced is a total ease of rewriting. Some authors straddle the ages; Michael Ondaatje writes by pen then literally cuts and pastes, with scissors and tape. For most, though, words require Word.
It’s a disturbing thought, especially for those of us who finished university in the early 1990s, just before word processors became common. We associate intellectual rigour with handwritten (or possibly typed) essays. But were those essays as good as they could have been? Didn’t the difficulty of rewriting hold us back? That final polish, so easy to achieve now, went by the board, replaced with a sighed ‘Nah, that’ll do’. Not for us the rigour of P.G. Wodehouse, who as he finished each page would pin it to the wall at a height indicating its quality. Low-lying ones were reworked, the aim being to get everything up to the picture rail.
The counter-argument to this ‘computer as the writer’s friend’ theory is provided by one of the few remaining non-qwertyists, D.J. Taylor. ‘The danger of being able to get the words quickly on to a screen,’ he tells me, ‘is that you assume you’ve written something. Whereas longhand makes you think about what you’re going to write. Typing it up [for emailing to a newspaper or publisher] is my second draft — but I’ve thought everything through so much that very little needs changing.’ Taylor’s wife used to work in publishing. ‘She says that computers had a very bad effect. Manuscripts started to get longer, because would-be authors could splurge. They had no pressure towards economy.’
Thought is obviously crucial, but I can’t help agreeing with another writer, Marcus Berkmann of this parish, that initial drafts can themselves be part of the thinking process. ‘I rewrite so much,’ he says, ‘that I’d never have been able to make a living doing this if I’d had to write in longhand, or even straight on to a typewriter.’ Very occasionally, though, he finds the pen mightier than the keyboard. ‘If I’m absolutely stuck, and the deadline’s approaching like an express train, I’ll go to the pub, taking a Tintin book to lean on, a small wad of 80 g.s.m. white paper and a Pilot V-5 pen. It never fails. I always come back with something workable.’ Note the continued need for specific writing materials. D.J. Taylor shares this, insisting on Uniball Eye pens, which have to be black. ‘Oh — and Extra Strong Mints.’
A very practical problem is handwriting. With nearly all communication now by text or email, mine has atrophied beyond mere illegibility; it’s a positively unpleasant sight. (Until the 20th century an inability to write was common, many people signing their name with an X. Are we heading back that way?) So even if I could be creative in longhand, looking back at the results would put me off. Seeing my words appear instantly on screen, however, in exactly the font and size of my choosing, provides encouragement that they might be worth something. Yes, D.J. Taylor is right to warn against complacency, but at least a start has been made. I’ve found this particularly true when writing fiction. Characters and events somehow come to life more easily. In shaky handwriting they would remain doubtful — and doubted — creatures of my imagination.
The organisational advantages of a computer are many: knowing instantly how many words you’ve written, Control-F telling you whether you’ve used a particular word so you can avoid repetition, that sort of thing. But one of the most subtle was shown by the very first laptop I owned, which I’d bought from another writer. His settings were still in place, including the screensaver that kicked in whenever you went two minutes without typing anything. ‘Get back to work,’ ran the scrolling message. ‘Stop doubting yourself. You can do this.’ The fact that he was a national newspaper columnist and still thought like this was a lesson in itself.
Some things, of course, still have to be written by hand. Letters of condolence, for one, and here Gordon Brown showed us the perils of not taking enough care with your pen. Postcards are another, though even here I know someone who has to type out what he wants to say before producing the handwritten version. Diaries too — somehow a journal stored on computer, or even one printed out and pasted into a book, would imply a distance, bizarrely between yourself and yourself but a distance nonetheless. Does the same apply between family members? I’m currently writing a letter to a close relative about a serious discussion we had. For ease of composition I’ve had to do it on computer — should I now transcribe and post it rather than just using email? Something tells me the answer is yes. Purity of thought and analysis is best served by the printed word, but when it comes to blood ties, and an awareness of their emotional illogicality, maybe some far-from-perfect handwriting is in order.