One night I dreamt of buying a set of pens. They were all the
sort of pens we used at school… made from red wood with
a detachable, dip in nib. There were maybe ten of these in a
clear plastic bag…. with an assortment of nibs. It was
the sort of ultra realist dream where you have to go through
a mental checklist of the last few days… where you’ve
been and what you’ve done… before you can be certain
it was a dream.
It brought back how much I’d enjoyed writing with these
pens. I still have a few nibs in a little Indian silver pot.
Somewhere, even now, the old school pen remains, unused for
a decade or two. In the dream I knew I had to buy the pens (even
though I had no need of more) because they resurrected a forgotten
pleasure in writing.
I have no memories at all of learning to read, but quite detailed
ones of learning to write. Filling the inkwell set into my desk,
turning to a fresh page in my exercise book, then carefully
dipping the nib into the ink and judging how much to apply.
The craft of the pen was given as much attention as the art
of forming the letters on the page. Press too hard and the tip
of the nib crossed over on itself. Hold it at the wrong angle
and the ink doesn’t flow. A single blot would ruin a whole
page and make the teacher, whose name and face are long forgotten,
extremely cross.
Yet there was a pleasure in learning to form the letters of
the alphabet, as though this gave a more satisfying mastery
than merely managing to recognise them.
There was little art to reading, especially in the late 1950’s
when I was taught by rote and repetition, but writing…
even individual letters… demanded more than just neatness
and careful copying. Each letter had a shape and soul. Curves,
circles, lines became much more than marks on a page. The resulting
letters had life. I had literally created them.
Now I realise that this long lost joy has transmuted into a
lesser pleasure… that of acquisition. I can’t resist
stationery shops and even a high street chain seems seductive.
Any new notebook is full of promise.
Aside from the drawer of ones yet to be touched, still virginal,
are the many barely consummated. There are books of favourite
quotes, miscellanies of interesting stories from newspapers
like the drowning man rescued by a giant turtle or fascinating
facts such as life cycle of the dragonfly, a meditation journal
and a beautifully bound book from Venice where I write about
memories and the loss of them. Then there are all the unfinished
stories, some essays and poems, not to mention the journals
that fill a whole drawer of my desk.
Pens too. In Ryman’s a young shop assistant watches my
every move, convinced I can’t intend to buy all the three
pens I’m holding in my hand. He’s obviously never
exhausted a pen in his entire life and responds with blatant
disbelief to my assertion that I go through one a month.
Like many writers, I’m fascinated by the actual process
of writing. I love picking up my favourite pen, the feel of
my hand resting on and moving across the unlined paper. But
too often my handwriting deteriorates into an ugly scrawl, as
though the actual writing has become a barrier to the expression
of ideas and the hoped for flow of creativity. And yes, there’s
also the terror of the blank page (for me Stanley Kubrick’s
The Shining is the ultimate movie about writer’s block)
and all the horrors evoked by ‘paperwork’.
I realise my writing has become too synonymous with the computer
and the entirely different pleasure of printer, screen and keyboard.
But thanks to this dream, in future I’ll remind myself
that creation is the gift of these letters, this paper, this
ink.