What Pens Did/do Famous Writers Use?

[coffeetoofull]

The London "Financial Times" newspaper for 9 July 2014 featured an article on Rudyard Kipling, "Gowex founder turns to Kipling". The photo is of Rudyard Kipling holding a dip fountain pen poised over an open silver ink bottle and pen tray. The photo is from the Corbis collection, which is free to the public. A quote from "If", 1910, by Kipling appears in this article, which is certainly appropriate to the Gowex article.

 

"If you can make a heap of all your winnings

And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss

And lose, and start again at your beginnings

And never breathe a word about your loss.

. . .

If you can fill the unforgiving minute

With sixty seconds worth of distance run

Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it

And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!"

I will never forget the reading of "If" by the indomitable actor, Charles Laughton.

There are, also, several sites to view authors writing tables, desks, and chairs on the internet - current authors are seen on "The Gaudrian" newspaper site, "Writers' Rooms".

Best Writings To You, coffeetoofull

Edited July 11, 2014 by coffeetoofull

[I.M.]

Hermann Hesse wrote with an Osmia Supra, which he sent in for rapair in 1930. When he got the pen back he wrote: "Herzlichen Dank für die reparierte Feder! Leider ist sie etwas gröber geworden, früher hat sie haarfein geschrieben. Aber ich selbst bin ja auch nicht mehr, was ich einst war, so will ich gern zufrieden sein."

 

Joachim Ringelnatz wrote a poem for his Montblanc: "Mir ist um mein Gepäck nicht bang./ Ich trage, was ich besitze,/ Novellen, Gedichte und Witze,/ Im Füllfederhalter von Montblanc."

 

Cheers!

 

Armin

Hesse's letter made me smile. I thought I'd offer a translation for those of you who would appreciate one:

"Heartfelt thanks for the repaired pen! Unfortunately it has become somewhat coarser, it used to write with a hair-fine line. But I am also not what I once was, so I shall gladly make do."

 

I'm terrible at translating poetry, so I'm not going to even try. But the general gist is that Ringelnatz doesn't really care too much about his luggage, he carries his belongings (novels, poems and jokes) in his Montblanc.

[betweenthelens]

Here's an interesting piece.

 

http://www.thepenmarket.com/vintage-pens-blog/category/famous-people-pens/

Edited July 21, 2014 by betweenthelens

[jameswatts]

In "My Reading Life," Pat Conroy stated that he writes with a fountain pen on yellow legal pads. I don't know what brand(s) though.

In "My Reading Life," Pat Conroy stated that he writes with a fountain pen on yellow legal pads. I don't know what brand(s) though.

I had the pleasure of interviewing Mr. Conroy recently. He has switched from fountain pens to Pilot V5 pens (the same model that Elmore Leonard used) for his book DEATH OF SANTINI. When we met a few weeks later, he presented me with the pen he used to writ the final pages of that book. I have that pen very carefully stored. As much as I love and used fountain pens, this is one of the most precious pens in my collection.

[Mags]

JamesWatts that pilot V5 is indeed special to treasure. They are a lovely pen if not wanting to worry about uncapped breaks.

[bernardo]

Here is Nobel laureate Camilo José Cela using a MB 149:

http://www.abc.es/Media/201105/13/CELAINTERNET--644x362.JPG

[rwilsonedn]

Here is Nobel laureate Camilo José Cela using a MB 149:

http://www.abc.es/Media/201105/13/CELAINTERNET--644x362.JPG

 

That is a fascinating way of holding a pen. I'm not sure I can even get my fingers to do that.

ron

[MontyMiguelAngel]

 

That is a fascinating way of holding a pen. I'm not sure I can even get my fingers to do that.

ron

Not loaded. The dip pen used as MontBlanc149

Edited July 29, 2014 by MontyMiguelAngel

[MontyMiguelAngel]

error

Edited July 29, 2014 by MontyMiguelAngel

[AustinMalone1999]

Neil Gaiman specifically mentions the Lamy 2000 as his novel writing pen.

[pdc13]

delete - posted in wrong thread

Edited August 26, 2014 by pdc13

[HandLikeAFist]

Virginia Woolf wrote - literally millions of words - with a dip pen, often on a writing board across her knees or the arms of her chair, very often with violet ink. I dunno if she ever used a fountain pen.

[Liamtyr]

Stephen King mentions Waterman Fountain pens several times in "On Writing" referring to it as the world's finest word processor. Below is a quote from the Author's Note from Dreamcatcher...Not my favorite novel but fountain pen related any how.

 

Author’s Note: “One final note. This book was written with the world’s finest word processor, a Waterman cartridge fountain pen. To write the first draft of such a long book by hand put me in touch with the language as I haven’t been in years. I even wrote one night (during a power outage) by candlelight. One rarely finds such opportunities in the twenty-first century, and they are to be savored.”-Stephen King

 

 

 

-=Liam

[montserratplay]

British playwright Tom Stoppard is one of us. Here's an extract from a recent Vanity Fair feature about him:

 

The last time we met, he said that he had recently given up writing with a quill because his last goose had died. He still doesn’t use a computer. “This is the inverse vanity of it. I proudly tell people I have no computer so as not to be ashamed of having no computer.”

He writes by pen—a stylish, silver Caran d’Ache fountain pen, made in Geneva. He’s grown accustomed to its nib. His personal assistant of 40 years, Jacky Matthews, has the computer. She has typed all his plays (and screenplays), which he then keeps re-writing by hand in a roundelay between them. His diplomatic P.A. has therefore always been his first audience.

 

 

http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2014/10/tom-stoppard-the-real-thing

 

If you are unfamiliar with his excellent plays, you may have seen a little film he co-wrote called Shakespeare in Love.

 

Here is the Caran d'Ache web site, in case you want to see some of their wares. They are pretty darn beautiful. http://store.carandache.com/int-en/61-fountain-pen

Edited October 27, 2014 by montserratplay

[zuhandensein]

Freud's fountain pen

 

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GAFVhGzB_p0/U77xKDxrCII/AAAAAAAAAMI/ib4QqdJwCJo/s1600/WP_20140624_015.jpg

 

Source: http://ricottaandspinach.blogspot.co.uk/

[Gloucesterman]

Freud's fountain pen

 

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-GAFVhGzB_p0/U77xKDxrCII/AAAAAAAAAMI/ib4QqdJwCJo/s1600/WP_20140624_015.jpg

 

Source: http://ricottaandspinach.blogspot.co.uk/

 

"And sometimes a fountain pen is Just a fountain pen..."

Siggie

Edited November 3, 2014 by brgmarketing

[BMG]

Just stumbled across these two photographs of Colette with her pen(s). I can't tell what kind they might be…

 

http://www.hotel-liondor.fr/francais/livres/colette-gourmande/portraitcolette.jpg

 

http://serge-passions.fr/images/colette_palais_royal_janine_niepce.jpg

 

[rwilsonedn]

In the New York Times today there is a photo feature on annotated first-edition books. One of them is Tony Kushner's Angels in America, on which he has written, in very bold letters, "One of the first stipulations I made" followed by a change to a much finer nib, and:

"-- changing fountain pens, I write w/fountain pens, always have, since I received my 1st, a Parker 75, on my Bar Mitzvah, & I find it hard to write w/anything else. I love old pens w/gold nibs -- more flexible, more expressive -- but on paper like this the ink flow from old pens is too much -- Anyway -- ..."

[Cepasaccus]

Colette's first FP looks to me like a safety because of the relatively small nib and it seems at the end is a small cap. The second FP looks to me like a lever filler.

[Cob]

Virginia Woolf wrote - literally millions of words - with a dip pen, often on a writing board across her knees or the arms of her chair, very often with violet ink. I dunno if she ever used a fountain pen.

I have a reference somewhere that her husband Leonard, used an Onoto.

 

Cob