Typewriters: The Ultimate Writing Machines

Do you find it hard to stay focused when you're doing work on the Internet? I sure do. Especially if what I'm trying to write involves a bit of research, or videos I want to share from YouTube, or responses to things other folks wrote which I need to track down and properly link and attribute. Within a few minutes after sitting down at the computer I find I've got a dozen tabs open with stuff I want to watch or read or reply to, and that's without even considering all the time I can spend fussing around with Spotify playlists.

There are lots of tools out there to help. Scrivener writing software has an elegant full-screen mode that gives you a blank page to look at, blocking out everything else on your desktop (including its suite of useful organizational tools). FocusWriter is a free Windows application that gives you the same single-minded experience, and it turns out there's a lot of paid versions that do the same thing.

Even with a single-minded application in your face, though, the temptation to toggle over Google or social media, or to pick up the old smart-phone can be too great. So how about cutting off the problem at the source? A program called Freedom can, for $6.99 a month, block your access to these resources for the periods you specify.

That starts to seem a little crazy. Now we're spending money to block access to the services we spent money to obtain. These addictions are strong, and it's no surprise they can drive us to extreme measures. But talk about first-world problems!

I'm pleased to report that I've found an even better distraction-free writing tool for the modern author. The manual typewriter.

Consider the advantages:

Manual typewriters operate without electricity. If you're survivalist-minded, you can use them in the apocalypse. They are fairly straightforward to maintain. A couple of screwdrivers and a bit of patience and curious prodding can get to the root of most of their mechanical problems, and if that's not enough, there are still dedicated servicemen around who can restore the more neglected and abused machines. Some of these typewriters have lasted 100 years and will likely make it 100 more. Their only consumables are paper and ribbons, both of which (believe it or not) are still available at office supply stores.

Best of all, they serve a single purpose: putting words on paper. They can't stream music. They can't play videos. They can't show you all the cool stuff your friends are doing while you're sitting in a dim room putting words on paper. They don't interrupt you to install updates or run anti-virus checks. They don't get viruses! It's just you, your hand-muscles, and your head-muscle.

Granted, it can take some getting used to. Pressing the keys takes a bit more effort, and when you reach the end of the line and hear that satisfying "ding", you've got to reach out and slide the carriage back to the beginning again. Typing at speed becomes a full upper body experience, more akin to playing the piano than tapping a laptop, or thumbing a tablet. As with hand-writing, I find this stimulates the imagination in ways I don't experience with more "advanced" technology.

The other big challenge is the lack of a "delete" key. There's no going back once you've made a mark. This slows me down a bit in the short term, as I tend to sit and think for a few seconds more before I'll put down a sentence. I'm okay with the fact that these are rough-draft machines. There's nothing wrong with trying the same sentence a few different ways and crossing out the ones that don't work, and winding up with an indelible record of the thought-process that brought me there. Surprisingly enough, I usually end up with better-reading copy when I start this way, probably because of the extra thought that goes into the first draft. When I start at the computer, there's a lot more cutting, pasting, and rearranging before I've produced the final product.

I've collected a couple dozen typewriters over the years, but more recently, on a minimalism kick, I've given away all but six. Give a typewriter to a kid and watch their eyes light up. There's something about the physicality of these machines that they really respond to. Kids these days don't often get to interact directly with devices that react directly to their input, and they find it fascinating. I gave one to the daughter of a co-worker a while back. It weighed over 25 pounds and she insisted on lugging it with her to school every day for the next week.

Here's a "kids react" video that shows some of this fascination.

The Smith Corona Super Sterling in the picture above is probably the best performing typewriter I've got, and it came to me for free from our local dump swap-shop. Miracle of miracles, it was in like-new condition, barely used and well maintained. I've gotten others at thrift stores, antique shops, and yard sales, and even received a few as gifts. Because typewriters were manufactured for over 100 years, once you start looking out for them, it's amazing how often they turn up.

Tom Hanks is a dedicated typewriter collector. Historians David McCullough and Robert Caro work almost exclusively on manual machines. So does Cormac McCarthy - he used a heavily worn but still stylish Olivetti Lettera until selling it at auction for a quarter million dollars and giving the proceeds to charity. They've become a lot more popular in the general population as well of late. A community of enthusiasts calling themselves the Typosphere have gotten into the habit of collecting and restoring typewriters, then sharing their experiences on typewritten pages which they scan and upload to their blogs. An inefficient exercise, to be sure, but one I've enjoyed myself in the past.

Richard Polt is perhaps the foremost authority in manual typewriters at the moment, and I'm happy to see that his book The Typewriter Revolution is doing so well. I'm also looking forward to catching California Typewriter when it plays at a local film-festival. The preview is below. But be careful - it's all too easy to burn hours watching typewriter videos when you could be writing!