Pen on paper

Pkmatrix said:

I'd like to use pen-and-paper more but (and maybe I'm showing my age a bit here), it's just so excruciatingly slow to me. My typing isn't fast enough to keep up with my thought processes, so writing by hand often feels like I've slowed myself to a snail's crawl. It can be fun, sure, and I'd love to do it more, but I can really only do it for short pieces...I could never write anything more than a few pages long that way before getting frustrated. I grew up with computers and have been an avid net surfer for half my life, I'm just too used to the faster-paced nature of digital word processing. ^_^()

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That slowness is a big part of why I love writing by hand. I constantly read that this writer or that loves using a computer because it lets them write as fast as they think. I believe writing as fast as yu think is why so many manuscripts suck.

The digital world has not increased the speed of the human brain, or the quality of manuscripts. Just the opposite.

To me, fast is not how many words I write, it's how well I write. With a computer, it's usually the first thought that gets written. With longhand, it's usually my second, third, or fourth thought that gets written. A manual typewriter is almost as good, at least if you believe science, because both have the same effect on writing, on which part of the brain gets activated, depending partly on speed.

I can't say I grew up with computers, but I used my first in 1979, so I'm pretty used to the digital world, as well, but I write quality better by writing it slower. Maybe my brain is faulty, but my first thought is seldom the best thought, and I think this is the weakness of word processors and keyboard.

This, and the belief that no matter how bad it is, you can easily rewrite it later.

Anyway, I'm far more prolific writing slow than writing fast because the slow writing goes from first word to submittable version faster, even though I don't write nearly as many words per minute as those who use a word processor, and keep up with their thoughts.

I agree. My prose is definitely better when I hand write, because it's a slower process. My hands keep better pace with my brain when I hand write. I'm a fast typer and my brain doesn't keep up when it's something like writing that requires analytical thinking.