The Joy of Writing With a Fountain Pen

I got a journal and a bottle of ink today. I am writing these words with these materials and a fountain pen, which I brought to Rochester, Minnesota, from my home where I lived with my parents in Chanhassen, Minnesota. I am currently writing the rough draft of this post on a picnic table facing a large pond next to the short-term facility where I am staying. Though it’s a bit breezy—and it was hot and humid today—I am enjoying writing this post outside now that evening is beginning and the temperature is dropping, especially in the shaded area I am in.

I’ve used fountain pens almost exclusively since I was approximately a junior in high school. That would be approximately since the fall of 2005. I had always loved pens and mechanical pencils as a child, so using a fountain pen was the next logical progression in my hobby of writing instruments. My first fountain pen—which was the only fountain pen I owned while in high school—was made by Cross and had a wine red barrel and gold-toned grip. I still own this fountain pen.

While I only used one fountain pen and one, or maybe two, bottle(s) of ink in high school, in college I branched out and purchased additional fountain pens and experimented with different inks. For example, I had a Lamy Safari with an extra fine nib that I used with bright orange ink for underlining text and writing in the margins of books. I was a literature major at Bard College in upstate New York, and it was strongly suggested by virtually every literature professor there that we should underline and take notes in our books. I attended Bard College from 2007 to 2010, and left the college without graduating. Interestingly, when I was a student at the University of Minnesota—Twin Cities from 2016 to 2019, where I completed a B.A. in English, I was never told to write in the books by any of my professors. I, therefore, did not write in my books while a student at the U, which was good for their resale value. By this time, I had accumulated a small but delightful collection of fountain pens, including a pricey Pelikan and Montblanc, both with gold nibs.

I started out a psychology major at Bard College, though I wanted a new major by the second semester of my freshman year. In my first semester of my sophomore year, I switched my major to literature and my advisor to the Pulitzer Prize-winning biographer Elizabeth Frank. I still remember nervously approaching her after class one day to ask if she could be my advisor.

“I would be honored,” she said, without the slightest bit of irony.

I still think about the life lessons she taught in the two classes on American literature I took with her. The main lesson she taught me as a writer and a person was to take life seriously, rather than as a joke. Frank was probably the most influential professor I ever had and is a bona fide genius. Her dad was the prolific writer, producer, and director Melvin Frank, who made many films during Hollywood’s Golden Age. He was the co-writer of “White Christmas.” His wife was investigated for accusations of communism during the McCarthy Era, and Frank wrote a semi-autobiographical novel, “Cheat and Charmer,” about her turbulent childhood. In an article or interview I once read about Frank, she said she writes everything initially with a fountain pen.

Which brings me back to the topic of this post. For the foreseeable future, I will write rough drafts of all of my posts while sitting on this picnic table facing a large pond that would make Thoreau proud. I will say that my ideas flow better when writing this way, as opposed to staring at a computer screen. If writing this way is good enough for Frank, it is good enough for me.