Tried writing with a fountain pen for my short story and it completely changed my pacing

I picked up a cheap Lamy Safari last week after seeing a post about slowing down your writing process. I'm working on a short story set in the 1920s and thought using a fountain pen would help me get in the right mindset. What I didn't expect was how much slower I wrote, like maybe half my normal speed on a keyboard. The ink smudged twice and my handwriting is terrible, but the story ended up being way tighter because I had to think before every sentence. I usually crank out 500 words in 20 minutes on a laptop, but with the pen I did 200 words in 45 minutes and they actually made sense. Has anyone else tried switching tools to change how they write, like going from digital to paper or using a typewriter?

3 comments

3 Comments

the_nathan15d ago

Man, that Lamy Safari is a good entry point. I had a buddy who swore by writing his first drafts on a manual typewriter for his noir novels. He said it forced him to commit to every word because fixing a typo meant tearing the page out and starting over. The kicker was he broke two typewriters in a year from slamming the keys too hard when he got frustrated with a scene. He switched to a fountain pen after that and said it actually mellowed him out, but he still has those mangled typewriter keys mounted on a board like some kind of war trophy.

kelly_craig15d ago

Wait, so you're telling me I could have been writing bad sentences slower this whole time instead of cranking out bad sentences fast on a keyboard? I tried switching to a typewriter once for a horror story and it was actually kind of terrifying. My cat jumped on the desk and somehow managed to type three random words that made more sense than my entire first draft.

grace_wright15d ago

Wait, are you serious? I was totally on the keyboard bandwagon too, but now you got me thinking. Maybe there's something to slowing down and actually forcing myself to think through each word.