Ink blots and typewriter plots

Hello all - 

Happy Sunday!  

​In 1986, I was in my final year at Manchester University and had to write up my dissertation in a form that was legible enough for someone to mark it. My solution? I went out (note “went out” as there was no Amazon in those days) and bought a £50 manual typewriter (no laptops either). If you remember working on typewriters, you’ll remember the pain; ribbons tearing, keys sticking together, Snopake to cover over mistakes. It seems unbelievable looking back.

Nowadays, I do all my writing directly on the computer. Doesn’t everybody?

Well, not everybody, as it turns out. Typewriters are still being produced and bought today. Perhaps it is nostalgia or that reassuring feel of striking a key and seeing the metal arm shoot out to thwack a single, carefully chosen letter onto the paper. Perhaps it’s the rhythmic sounds; the clack of the key, the thud of the space bar or the ding-a-ling of the carriage return. Perhaps it’s a rare chance to think and write distraction-free.

I recently read a fantastic book by Robert Caro called ‘Working’. Caro is most notable for writing in detail on the life of former US President Lyndon Johnson, amongst others. In fact, to date, he has clocked up over 3,000 pages on this one subject. Luckily, in 2019, he took a time-out to write about the business of writing and I am delighted he did. It was a great opportunity to look into the mind of such a prolific producer of words.

I was amazed to find that he still writes most of his first drafts with pen and paper. In fact, he rewrites these notes by hand as well. When he is happy with his rewritten notes, he pulls out his trusty Smith Corona Electra 210 typewriter to type up these notes for presentation to his publisher.

Slightly later model of the Smith Corona 210 - Miloš Jurišić,
CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Caro finds using pen and paper allows him to engage with his work more deeply as well as help with memory retention. He also believes this direct relationship between him, pen and paper enhances creativity.

It’s worth a thought in this digital age.

Tomorrow marks the day, 10 June 1938, when the ballpoint pen was first patented by László Bíró. László was born in Hungary but fled from the Nazis during WWII to Argentina, where he lived for the rest of his life. The fountain pens in use at the time suffered from ink leakage and smudging, not helped by the slow drying time of the ink. While working as a journalist, Biro observed how quickly the ink dried during newspaper printing and set about replicating this feature in a pen.

In fact, John J. Loud invented and patented a ‘ballpoint’ pen some 50 years earlier, in 1888. The venture was not a commercial success, and the patent eventually lapsed.

However, Biro’s pen was a great success, and in 1945, the BIC company bought the patent from him. While the BIC biro may not suit Robert Caro in maximising that feel and connection with the paper, it has become one of the world’s must-have writing tools, selling over 100 billion biros to date.

Now, that’s what you call a success story.

Podcast episode... a look back

Episode 38. Outback Odyssey​

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Argentinian-born Nico Marino spent a few of his early years cycling across Europe, Asia, and Africa. In 2016, he decided to move to Sydney, Australia, but instead of the obvious choice of flying into Sydney on the East Coast, he chose to fly into Perth on the West Coast and cycle to Sydney 5,000 km across the heart of Australia. I was lucky to catch up with Nico to discuss his extraordinary adventure in Episode 38. Outback Odyssey.

Halfway into his ride, Nico reached the well-known spot of Ayers Rock, now referred to by its Aboriginal name ‘Uluru’. Henry Ayers was a 19th century South Australian politician after whom the rock was originally named by the explorer William Gosse in 1873. Tuesday marks the day, 11 June 1897, that Ayers died at the age of 76.

Well before Nico reached Uluru, he passed through the famous mining town of Kalgoorlie. Thursday marks the day, 14 June 1893, when gold was first discovered there. Back in my younger days, I worked for a short period as an engineer's mate for a company that maintained the air conditioning in the gold mines in Kalgoorlie, though I’m not sure I would fit today in the narrow tube-lifts that took me down to the seams back then.

Listen now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music or just about any other. podcast player of your choice.  Check out the show notes and  transcript to learn more.  

My favourite quote from the episode...

The most striking memory for Nico when cycling through the heart of Australia was the absolute nothingness. This is what he had to say…

"When I say nothingness, it's literally nothingness. I had crossed the Gobi Desert, the Sahara Desert twice, the deserts of Angola, Namibia. But in all of them, every 20 to 30ks you find people,  you find wildlife. In Australia, there are no people and almost no animals at least in mid-winter, right? When you say you're in the middle of nowhere, you are really in the middle of nowhere."

"From the horizon to the top of the sky, you've got stars. It's like blanketed with billions of stars. So that makes it extremely mesmerizing. And the other thing is that it's combined with the absence of noise. It's marvellous. Brushing your teeth can become distressing because of the noise."

By the way...

This Tuesday, 11 June 1993, marks the day that the Daily Mail reported the following:

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BRITON KIDNAPPED: "A British volunteer clearing mines in Cambodia has been kidnapped by Khmer Rouge guerillas. Christopher Moon, from Reading, his Cambodian driver and an interpreter were working for the charity Halo Trust when they were seized by a group of gunmen. No reason was given." DAILY MAIL

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Spoiler alert, Chris made it to safety and spoke to me about his terrifying ordeal in Episode 46. The Khmer Rouge, Mr Clever and Me. Well worth listening in.

Dates with History...

Today...

Sticking with prolific writers for a moment, today, 9 June 1870, marks the death of the great English writer, Charles Dickens, at the age of 58, buried in Westminster Abbey. Similarly to Caro, the regular pause to dip the quill into the ink together with a relatively slow writing pace must have fueled Dicken’s creativity.
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Later this week...

Another prolific writer from the 18th Century was Captain William Bligh, of Mutiny on The Bounty fame. Among other publications, Bligh wrote about the mutiny in his book, the rather prosaically named “A Narrative of the Mutiny on Board His Majesty's Ship Bounty”.

This included being set adrift in a small sailing craft and embarking on a 3,600-mile journey to safety. Friday marks the date, 14 June 1879, that Bligh successfully and miraculously sailed into a port in Timor, some 47 days later.

Question of the week...

(answer at bottom of newsletter)

And finally...

I have kept hold of this photo since my youngest son was at College. On his first day, I dropped him off, parking briefly in one of the bays earmarked for staff. The sign didn’t fill me with a lot of hope!

Spread the word...

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Answer to Question of the week: Pitcairn Island.

United Kingdom Hydrographic Office,
Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

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You can listen to the Batting the Breeze podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Overcast, Pocket Casts, Amazon Music or any other podcast player of your choice. See podcast player links at the top of this page.
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