Sir, – Writing letters by hand is certainly becoming a dying art (“A write-off”, Magazine, December 1st).
As so-called “Agony Aunt” in the Sunday Press in the 1960 to 1980 period, I wrote every letter by hand for the first years of my work. Letters for copy and umpteen private letters sallied forth from my pen each week. Editor Frank Carty didn’t comment. The amount I wrote sitting in my armchair by the fire is an unkept record! I used a Parker fountain pen in those years because that was the most comfortable way for me to operate (I still have it). I even have a page or two of the green blotting paper! It didn’t seem strange to be writing by hand in this comfortable position. At 18 I had learned to type on an ancient typewriter. Only when the work became in need of speeding-up and I could afford a new machine, did I revise my typing. Even then – as now – I prefer to write by hand.
Then came the Bic pen and of course I tried it, wherewith my handwriting disimproved. Blobby ballpoints, anti blotting-paper, became a new problem interrupting creative expression.
Almost everyone who wrote to me wrote by hand – some even with pencil. The handwriting varied enormously, some very difficult to read, but much of it was copperplate.
I am now a technophobe for two reasons. First, at 81 I can’t remember all the new communications technologies. Second, I don’t want to be talking or texting all day, as seems to be the way now. I still handwrite letters to people most of whom became handwriting correspondents of mine over the years. Ashamed? Not a bit. But I hope that somebody gives me a Christmas gift of Philip Hensher’s book The Missing Ink. I’ll sit in my armchair reading, remembering and enjoying. – Yours, etc,