This work is consistent with the practical claims you make in your recent post. But your post is about the effects of handwriting on one's output, one's intellectual and/or writerly productivity. You are concerned mostly with *effects*, not so much the causes of those effects. This is fine with me.
Like you, I'm a left-handed person, and probably like you, I've been sucked into the universe of the internet since the invention of the net. My daily problem (and it is a problem) is the temptation to read all of the NY Times, all of The Guardian, all of Le Monde, following endless leads to topics that may or may not be helpful in the writing work I'm supposed to be doing (which is about the history of educational experiments in Europe since 1900).
If one decides to go on an internet work stoppage--or at any rate a slow-down in internet-based work--then handwriting is a natural outcome. It's part of a declaration of independence. As a Canadian, I don't feel any particular urge to declare independence in the way Thomas Jefferson did, but I *do* feel an urge to unhitch my wagon from the internet, even if only for a few hours each day.
There was a nice article in the Toronto Star last week on a likely policy of the U of Toronto Faculty of Law in the 2026-2027 academic year--to forbid the use of laptops in class, requiring students to handwrite their work:
I suspect that this faculty-wide policy won't stand up to the pressure of everyday life in the age of AI (it will be worthwhile to check in on the U of T law faculty's final decision in a couple of weeks. Still, the U of T Law people are making a worthwhile effort to recover from a thirty-year headlong rush to reduce everything to keyboards, mechanical keys, bright screens, and endlessly fascinating chains of accidentally discovered URLs.
Your blog post was thoroughly enjoyable, by the way. Thank you for it. It's ironic that I discovered it because I was spending too much time on the internet. But there we are...
Thank you for these reflections. I’ll keep an eye on the law school, because now I’m interested too. That seems an excellent test case for the viability of handwriting-only classrooms, since I understand law students have to take quite extensive notes.
2. Imagine extreme longevity. How quickly would time pass! In Borges’ ‘The Immortals’ the triglodytes staring indifferently into space, nibbling the occasional fly- what a blur it would be. No wonder action seems pointless to them.
Yes! I love imagining the sheer speed of consciousness implied by extreme longevity. I have a short story I’ve been noodling at for years exploring the idea that it would be a problem for immortals that they’d sort of zone out—for a subjective instant —and accidentally miss a few hundred years.
"Do concepts exist apart from words... ?" Most certainly! I sometimes (not infrequently) know the thought before I know the language to express it. There's a distinct feeling of being in that in-between space. I think that must be what you're describing too as you grasp for words. You're trying the words on to see if they fit, discarding some because they don't. What are you measuring their fit against? Your pre-verbal thought.
I agree with you. To be honest, I included that aside as a wink to certain philosophical interlocutors I know to be reading my newsletter, with whom I’ve argued this point at length.
Somewhat. I find I use fewer unnecessary adjectives and adverbs, so I guess my clauses are tighter, but I do also find I am more willing to assay long complicated sentence structures. Mainly, I’m just much more aware of the texture of each individual sentence—I vary long and short better, for example—which I think accounts for both of the differences I mentioned.
Textural awareness is a good way to put it. I also find, like you state in the essay, that I lean on stock phrases less when writing by hand (and I draft everything by hand first). But I worry sometimes that my terseness comes from past battles with carpal tunnel rather than style.
As you'd expect, there is much neurological research comparing handwriting with typing. An example:
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC11943480/
This work is consistent with the practical claims you make in your recent post. But your post is about the effects of handwriting on one's output, one's intellectual and/or writerly productivity. You are concerned mostly with *effects*, not so much the causes of those effects. This is fine with me.
Like you, I'm a left-handed person, and probably like you, I've been sucked into the universe of the internet since the invention of the net. My daily problem (and it is a problem) is the temptation to read all of the NY Times, all of The Guardian, all of Le Monde, following endless leads to topics that may or may not be helpful in the writing work I'm supposed to be doing (which is about the history of educational experiments in Europe since 1900).
If one decides to go on an internet work stoppage--or at any rate a slow-down in internet-based work--then handwriting is a natural outcome. It's part of a declaration of independence. As a Canadian, I don't feel any particular urge to declare independence in the way Thomas Jefferson did, but I *do* feel an urge to unhitch my wagon from the internet, even if only for a few hours each day.
There was a nice article in the Toronto Star last week on a likely policy of the U of Toronto Faculty of Law in the 2026-2027 academic year--to forbid the use of laptops in class, requiring students to handwrite their work:
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/u-of-ts-law-school-wants-professors-to-ban-laptops-from-class-some-students-are-pushing-back/article_44ff02cd-65bd-4e36-81a1-8ac5917e31d2.html
I suspect that this faculty-wide policy won't stand up to the pressure of everyday life in the age of AI (it will be worthwhile to check in on the U of T law faculty's final decision in a couple of weeks. Still, the U of T Law people are making a worthwhile effort to recover from a thirty-year headlong rush to reduce everything to keyboards, mechanical keys, bright screens, and endlessly fascinating chains of accidentally discovered URLs.
Your blog post was thoroughly enjoyable, by the way. Thank you for it. It's ironic that I discovered it because I was spending too much time on the internet. But there we are...
Thank you for these reflections. I’ll keep an eye on the law school, because now I’m interested too. That seems an excellent test case for the viability of handwriting-only classrooms, since I understand law students have to take quite extensive notes.
Dang it. I'm going to have to do this too, aren't I? This post is a real "proof is in the pudding" type situation.
1. Nice Handke quote.
2. Imagine extreme longevity. How quickly would time pass! In Borges’ ‘The Immortals’ the triglodytes staring indifferently into space, nibbling the occasional fly- what a blur it would be. No wonder action seems pointless to them.
Yes! I love imagining the sheer speed of consciousness implied by extreme longevity. I have a short story I’ve been noodling at for years exploring the idea that it would be a problem for immortals that they’d sort of zone out—for a subjective instant —and accidentally miss a few hundred years.
"Do concepts exist apart from words... ?" Most certainly! I sometimes (not infrequently) know the thought before I know the language to express it. There's a distinct feeling of being in that in-between space. I think that must be what you're describing too as you grasp for words. You're trying the words on to see if they fit, discarding some because they don't. What are you measuring their fit against? Your pre-verbal thought.
I agree with you. To be honest, I included that aside as a wink to certain philosophical interlocutors I know to be reading my newsletter, with whom I’ve argued this point at length.
I tend to find that drafting by hand means I am a lot more terse/economical than when I type. Does that happen with you as well?
Somewhat. I find I use fewer unnecessary adjectives and adverbs, so I guess my clauses are tighter, but I do also find I am more willing to assay long complicated sentence structures. Mainly, I’m just much more aware of the texture of each individual sentence—I vary long and short better, for example—which I think accounts for both of the differences I mentioned.
Textural awareness is a good way to put it. I also find, like you state in the essay, that I lean on stock phrases less when writing by hand (and I draft everything by hand first). But I worry sometimes that my terseness comes from past battles with carpal tunnel rather than style.
i never learned to be more than a one-finger typist
I sort of envy you. Personally I cannot remember a time when I could not touch type. It’s too much.