Jump to content

Red Ink


KatrinaLouise1990

Recommended Posts

I'm not 100% sure this is the right place and I apologise if it is not.

 

Ever since I was a little girl my mum has always instilled in me that it is rude to write in red pen / ink. I have grown up with this mantre and have never really used red pens at all even my red sharpies lie unused while the other colours are in regular use. But as I have grown older I have noticed that red ink is being used a lot more whereas in my younger years I only ever really saw it when my teachers were correcting work and the like although that seems to not be common practice any more. I have even recieved some of my favourite autographs signed in red.

 

So I am wondering is it really rude to write in red? or is it one of those old wives tales which has been passed down?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 28
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • KatrinaLouise1990

    3

  • Zaarin

    2

  • inkstainedruth

    2

  • FPFan

    1

I think it depends where you live and who is going to look at the writing. Like, in the UK it might be considered rude to use red ink for correspondence.

Sailor Professional Gear GT B Nib

Sailor Sapporo GT F Nib

Pelikan M1000 (black) B Nib

Bexley Simplicity bronze GT B nib

Pilot VP blue/GT B nib

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think it depends where you live and who is going to look at the writing. Like, in the UK it might be considered rude to use red ink for correspondence.

 

Probably should have added that. I am in the UK (Devon to be precise) and have asked other UKers before and most didn't have a clue what I was going on about re. red being rude but then my mum had to have gotten it from somewhere (she doesn't remind so it must be old info).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Katrina,

 

I just cannot bring myself to write in red, with the exception of marking work by students. I was always told that red was used for marking, not writing.

 

I write in black, and proof/edit using blue. I can't use green, because that is reserved for the auditors.

 

Different cultures have different rules.

 

It really is up to you, but think of the recipient or audience for what you are writing: you wouldn't want to offend, would you? I suppose that what I am trying to say is that while my young children wouldn't bat an eyelid at receiving a letter written in red ink, my mother and I would most certainly find it odd, if not rude.

 

Hope this helps.

 

View

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I use red ink at Christmas for Christmas Cards and some writing.Also sometimes use it a little at Valentines Day.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

rude to write in red pen / ink.

 

I can understand this being said about red ink, but a red pen? How on earth does the intended recipient know what colour the pen is, I wonder?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

rude to write in red pen / ink.

 

I can understand this being said about red ink, but a red pen? How on earth does the intended recipient know what colour the pen is, I wonder?

 

Sorry I did not mean a red pen per say but rather a pen which writes in red.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ah, right. I suppose that might come from the BIC-like habit of indicating a cheap ballpoint's ink color on some part of the pen itself, so red pen = red ink.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hello,

 

I too am adverse to using red-colour ink for routine matters.

 

At the office, I use a blue-black ink exclusively; and for personal correspondence I range from a dark turquoise, through peacock blue to light blue though the blues and end at blue-black. I have single pots of brown and grey - also long-standing personal correspondence colours. I do not have or use black ink.

 

I did have an epiphany when I was given a Pink Lamy Safari, which wouldn't tolerate the inks I had. Consequently, I searched for a warm ink: not Red, not Pink. Along the way I discovered several inks that I now use when writing to certain people: Herbin 'Larmes de Cassis', R&K 'Alt Bordeaux' and thanks to kushbaby the absolute 'blow away the blues & blahs' ink Pilot Iroshizuku series 'yu-yaki'.

 

I did come across a nice stock Red, the Montblanc 2007 Seasons Greetings ink, which is a nice deep red, and is OK for greeting cards, etc. For billet doux I usually mix one-off Reds from Magenta + Yellow inks.

 

So to me, yes, it is rude to write in red Red, certainly for more than say 1/2 a page. That is loutish 'shouting'. If I were to receive such a letter, I would think that the author had gone off the rails, needed their meds adjusted, etc.

 

The use of the 3 inks I mentioned above are not red Reds, so I'm comfy writing multi-page letters with them.

 

Oh, but once a friend mentioned, "I'd read your letters even if they were written in purple." Ha! So I got a few sheets of florescent yellow paper, and loaded a broad-nib pen with the exploding violet ink from R&K, their 'Soliferno'. Yikes! I thought I'd have the HazMat people on me. ... Rude? No - just a rough joke.

 

In all honesty, if you're not comfortable using Red, then don't. Simple, yes?

 

Best Regards,

Sandy1

The only time you have too much fuel is when you're on fire.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I can't even imagine what NOT having a red ink around would be like. I've always had a bottle of Waterman Red. Anytime love or Christmas is in the air the red ink comes out. As a matter of fact I was just looking at my personal ink chart to see which of my reds I want to use this coming week. I just emptied Noodlers Nikita out of my black M300 F nib pen cause it smeared on the Fabriano Medioevalis 208E note card I was using to write my grandson a note.

 

I also make my own calendar weekly planner and alway use red for holidays, birthdays, and other important dates. (Okay, sometimes I use orange for Halloween, browns for fall and Thanksgiving, sometimes even go so far as to use pastel colors in the spring. But no doubt, I always have at least one RED on hand.

Fair winds and following seas.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

While it may not be considered rude amongst my friends, bright or true red isn't one of my favorite colors to read. However, push it towards brown or black and I find it totally acceptable for some correspondence. My most recent discovery of Noodler's Red Black in a Sailor 1911 fine nib is getting a lengthy workout on soft gray paper in my daily journal. That combination might be lovely in a letter to a pen friend but not to a non-FP person. Prefer not to have my frame of mind misconstrued.

A certified Inkophile

inkophile on tumblr,theinkophile on instagram,inkophile on twitter

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I use red for Christmas greeting cards and valentine's day cards. I also keep one pen inked with red for important reminders to myself on my calendar. As for correspondence, I don't think it is good to use because it is kind of hard on the eyes if the missive is very long, so I guess in that sense it would be rude to send a hard to read letter.

Lashelle

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've never written nor received a letter in true red. I would consider writing one and wouldn't be offended by receiving one in a variation like Noodler's Red Black, which I love. I don't know why I don't write letters in red; I just... don't. If someone sent me one, even in true red, I don't think I'd care.

 

I have lots of red that I use mostly for grading papers. In that case, I intend of offend. :roflmho:

Vanessa

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I use red all the time. Tiananmen, Levenger, Skrip, MB, Herbin. Of course those are all different moods but they all fill the bill. Sometimes for a birthday card or Christmas card plus green in any case). Have yet to hear that such hand-written cards aren't readily appreciated (because of the colours alone).

I usually use more blue-blacks, blues and greens, but why not a red too?

Main thing is that you yourself like it and you're not a pupil in elementary school.

 

Mike

Life is too short to drink bad wine (Goethe)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Perhaps one consideration is that red ink may be harder too read? I do find some hard to read. If it's too bright red the contrast is too hard to read comfortably. However, a dark red I think is fine.

 

Cedar

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I use red ink often in my notebooks /diaries / journals. I'm not a fan of highlighters, so I write in red. To be honest, I use it as often as my black ink.

Esterbrook J (Noodler's H.O.D.)

Sailor 1911-silver trim, M (Kiwa-Guro)

Sailor K.O.P.-silver trim, M (Kiwa-Guro)

Platinum Preppy 03 (Noodler's H.O.D.)

Platinum Preppy 03 (Noodler's Nikita)

Sailor Super Air art pen, EEF (Kiwa-Guro)

Rotring art pen, EF (Kiwa-Guro)

soon to have...Nakaya Cigar-Long, M nib, black ebonite w/ Urushi (Noodler's HoD)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've been trying without success to find a thread that covered this topic last year in The Write Stuff, or Penmanship, not too sure where it was, but no luck, the new search box is useless for me.

Anyhow, in many cultures Red was reserved to the maximum authority and death penalties, excommunications, etc. were written in it. So it is considered very bad manners. It depends to who you're writing to, probably a FPN member will be happy to receive some reds to compare, or in a letter among other inks. I use blacks, BB, blues and browns for personal correspondence. Dark teals are nice as well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 8 years later...

Interesting thread. I too live in the UK and have never heard that it is rude to write in red ink. Many companies do send their final demand invoices out in red ink. Perhaps that's why some people could be offended if they associate final demands with red ink.

 

It's possible that red ink is seen, by some people, as similar to shouting in electronic communication when people use capital letters in text and email.

 

I must admit that red ink does remind me of marked school work (ticks, crossings out and "six out of ten - must try harder!").

 

Having said that, I have a bottle of Shaeffer Skrip Red which I use in my journal. I ink all my pens up with different colours and each entry in the journal is with a different colour. The red entries do brighten up the page.

Live life, not long life

Link to comment
Share on other sites

When writing to close friends, use whatever colour you like; close friends will readily forgive you even if they hate the colour of your ink.

 

But for writing to people that in some way are "important" and that you're not familiar with, the only possible colour is of course black, especially if you want to ask them a favor.

 

In similar cases, even blue is inappropriate. Blue is considered a "standard" colour today. But before the 20th Century nobody wrote with blue ink; and the overwhelming majority of the original "official" letters of the first half of the 20th Century I preserve are in black.

 

And yes, red was already used in the Middle Ages; but for special purposes, certainly not as a standard colour.

Italix Captain's Commission F – Italix Parson's Essential F – Kaweco Dia2 EF – Pilot Custom 74 SF – Sailor 1911 Simply Black F – TWSBI Classic EF – Rotring Altro F

 

“As for the qualities of which you may know, ‘These qualities lead to dispassion, not to passion; to being unfettered, not to being fettered; to shedding, not to accumulating; to modesty, not to self-aggrandizement; to contentment, not to discontent; to seclusion, not to entanglement; to aroused persistence, not to laziness; to being unburdensome, not to being burdensome’: You may definitely hold, ‘This is the Dhamma, this is the Vinaya, this is the Teacher’s instruction.’”

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now


  • Most Contributions

    1. amberleadavis
      amberleadavis
      43844
    2. PAKMAN
      PAKMAN
      33501
    3. Ghost Plane
      Ghost Plane
      28220
    4. inkstainedruth
      inkstainedruth
      26627
    5. jar
      jar
      26101
  • Upcoming Events

  • Blog Comments

    • Shanghai Knife Dude
      I have the Sailor Naginata and some fancy blade nibs coming after 2022 by a number of new workshop from China.  With all my respect, IMHO, they are all (bleep) in doing chinese characters.  Go use a bush, or at least a bush pen. 
    • A Smug Dill
      It is the reason why I'm so keen on the idea of a personal library — of pens, nibs, inks, paper products, etc. — and spent so much money, as well as time and effort, to “build” it for myself (because I can't simply remember everything, especially as I'm getting older fast) and my wife, so that we can “know”; and, instead of just disposing of what displeased us, or even just not good enough to be “given the time of day” against competition from >500 other pens and >500 other inks for our at
    • adamselene
      Agreed.  And I think it’s good to be aware of this early on and think about at the point of buying rather than rationalizing a purchase..
    • A Smug Dill
      Alas, one cannot know “good” without some idea of “bad” against which to contrast; and, as one of my former bosses (back when I was in my twenties) used to say, “on the scale of good to bad…”, it's a spectrum, not a dichotomy. Whereas subjectively acceptable (or tolerable) and unacceptable may well be a dichotomy to someone, and finding whether the threshold or cusp between them lies takes experiencing many degrees of less-than-ideal, especially if the decision is somehow influenced by factors o
    • adamselene
      I got my first real fountain pen on my 60th birthday and many hundreds of pens later I’ve often thought of what I should’ve known in the beginning. I have many pens, the majority of which have some objectionable feature. If they are too delicate, or can’t be posted, or they are too precious to face losing , still they are users, but only in very limited environments..  I have a big disliking for pens that have the cap jump into the air and fly off. I object to Pens that dry out, or leave blobs o
  • Chatbox

    You don't have permission to chat.
    Load More
  • Files






×
×
  • Create New...