Noodler's Tolstoy

[yazeh]

Noodler’s Tolstoy

 

 

Tolstoy on 23 May 1908 at Yasnaya Polyana,[1] Lithograph print by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky

 

Disclaimer:

 

I’ve been avoiding reviewing this ink, mostly because I dislike Tolstoy. I have read some of his books in my youth and recently watched a documentary about him, preparing this review. I was impressed by his very modern vision of school system (mostly like the modern Finnish school systems) and “liberating” his serfs.

 

The second part of his life, he becomes erratic. The highlight, I believe, was being ex-communicated by the Russian Orthodox church  

And to deprive his wife and children of the royalties of his books in favour of charities. It left me perplexed as it was his wife who transcribed his undecipherable handwriting of his early masterpieces. 

 

There's a 2009 film, The Last Station which deals with Tolstoy's struggle to balance fame, wealth and his ideal of living devoid of material things. 

 

However, this is an ink review. 😛
 

The greatest part of doing this review was discovering the fantastic colour photography by Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky.

You can see most of them here: 

https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/empire/ethnic.html

  

So, lets get on with the ink review with the chroma:

I don’t like this ink. Filling the pen is torture. The chemical smell is awful and thankfully dissipate with time. But it gave me a headache a couple of sneezes. This isn't a good ink, it has start up issues, it hated pilot Elite, had hiccups with Lamy Safari, until I wrote a few lines, but tolerated well Pilot Kakuna. 

 

I recommend it, only to those, who have no sense of smell, love Tolstoy, like a challenging ink, are light handed, use well sealed wet pens and work under UV lights. 

 

Writing Samples:

Note the difference between the Ef in Pilot Elite and Kakuna. I really had to press hard the Elite to make it write. 

I didn't bother to scan of the "good papers". But if you're heavy handed, use wet pens, you'll have ghosting and probably a bit of bleed through. 

Photo:

 

Watertest:

Left side was held under water. Kitty was waterproof

Comparison:

 

And finally a sketch. I do the yearly Inktober challenge. The prompt was Beard. 

The black ink is Sailor Kiwa-guro.

fluorescence:

 

· Pens used: Pilot Elite/ Kakuna(Ef/), Lamy Safari (Ef/F/M/B) 

· What I liked: Fast dry time, spectacular fluorescence (I’m pushing it!)

· What I did not like: Name, and chemical stench, bleed through, flow issues.

· What some might not like: Same as above, minus the name

· Shading: No

· Ghosting: On most papers yes.

· Bleed through: Depending nib, paper. If you’re heavy handed for sure. 

· Flow Rate: Wet

· Lubrication: Ok

· Nib Dry-out: No.

· Start-up: It didn’t like Pilot Elite. Lamy stopped working after a few days of not using. 

· Saturation: Sort of. 

· Shading Potential: Dismal

· Sheen: No

· Spread / Feathering / Woolly Line: Didn’t notice. 

· Nib Creep / “Crud”: Yes

· Staining (pen): Possible

· Clogging: No. 

· Cleaning: Like most permanent inks, the more the ink stays in the pen, the more time consuming it is to clean. I won’t recommend these inks for pens that cannot be fully dismantled and pens that don’t have a great seal. The pilot Kakuna’s transparent section was tainted in a lovely blue hue, and no amount of Q-tip would remove it, but after several hours of soaking, I should be able to remove it. Safari needed an overnight soaking, and 5 minutes in pen cleaning solution, as a safe measure. 

· Water resistance: Excellent.

· Availability: 90 ml bottles / 3 Oz bottles 

 

Please don't hesitate to share your experience, writing samples or any other comments. The more the merrier 

 

[lapis]

Thanks again for your most meritorious masterwork as re description of such literary wonders. Liking this type of author or not is of course a completely subjective matter (duh!) but I have to agree with you that at least the colour is discriminating. I'm not all that hot about turquoises in general (who cares?) but a washed out, creamy one at that is maybe even comparable to the smell (with which I am not familiar). What does it smell like? Phenol would be nice (at least for me). Too bad the other physical properties here which you also disdain -- or, may I say loathe? -- seem to substantiate everything else about this fluid. Well, there are other inks in this department which boast more positive traits....

[lapis]

To augment our compilation of perversities here, it's weird (or was it wonderful?) that this ink -- at least its name -- was used 15 years ago by Nathan to depict a washed out, creamy coral-orange tone.

 

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/75290-noodlers-tolstoy/

[LizEF]

3 hours ago, yazeh said:

Kitty looks bent out of shape at someone dumping water on one half of his body!

 

Thank you for enduring this ink and saving the rest of us from having to do so, @yazeh!    (Perhaps Nathan was trying to emulate the erratic later years of Tolstoy's life.... )

[yazeh]

2 hours ago, lapis said:

Thanks again for your most meritorious masterwork as re description of such literary wonders.ç

🙏

2 hours ago, lapis said:

 

Liking this type of author or not is of course a completely subjective matter (duh!) but I have to agree with you that at least the colour is discriminating. I'm not all that hot about turquoises in general (who cares?) but a washed out, creamy one at that is maybe even comparable to the smell (with which I am not familiar).

2 hours ago, lapis said:

I believe Nathan was trying to recreate, Tolstoy blue shirt in Sergey Prokudin-Gorsky, photograph/lithograph. I read a bit about the process. It took him 6 seconds to take this photograph. 

2 hours ago, lapis said:

 

What does it smell like? Phenol would be nice (at least for me).

Think an industrial strength cleanser. The moment I open the vial the scent over powers my nostrils, like smelling concentrated bleach, mixed with gasoline The effect to my sense of smell, is like an arrow in the nostril. It even gave me a mild momentary headache

 

2 hours ago, lapis said:

 

Too bad the other physical properties here which you also disdain -- or, may I say loathe? -- seem to substantiate everything else about this fluid. Well, there are other inks in this department which boast more positive traits....

Dostoyevsky and Lermontov are far more superior inks in this regard.

 

[yazeh]

2 hours ago, lapis said:

To augment our compilation of perversities here, it's weird (or was it wonderful?) that this ink -- at least its name -- was used 15 years ago by Nathan to depict a washed out, creamy coral-orange tone.

 

https://www.fountainpennetwork.com/forum/topic/75290-noodlers-tolstoy/

Yeah, that seems more creative as a colour. But then Tolstoy reminds me a bit of 19th century St. Francis of Assisi

[yazeh]

52 minutes ago, LizEF said:

Kitty looks bent out of shape at someone dumping water on one half of his body!

Yeah, it's bit different to align the warped piece of paper along the other one, but she's the water loving type. So water is fun 😹

52 minutes ago, LizEF said:

 

Thank you for enduring this ink and saving the rest of us from having to do so, @yazeh!    (Perhaps Nathan was trying to emulate the erratic later years of Tolstoy's life.... )

The scent maybe, is the scent of moralistic types, those who never practice what they preach

The colour is definitely a nod to the shirt he's wearing

[Sailor Kenshin]

@yazeh…. Thanks!  I had no idea that's what Tolstoy was like.  The sketch is wonderfully spooky.

 

'His' ink is a color I enjoy, but it looks similar to Lermontov, seems flat, and smelly inks that dispense headaches?  Nope.  You took one for the team! 

 

 

[yazeh]

1 hour ago, Sailor Kenshin said:

@yazeh…. Thanks!  I had no idea that's what Tolstoy was like.  The sketch is wonderfully spooky.

Quite fierce looking. In the documentary there is some footage of him, and then there's an interview with his youngest daughter

 

1 hour ago, Sailor Kenshin said:

 

'His' ink is a color I enjoy, but it looks similar to Lermontov, seems flat, and smelly inks that dispense headaches?  Nope.  You took one for the team! 

 

 

Yep, pity, such a nice colour is so stinky

 

[inkstainedruth]

@yazeh -- Thanks as usual for the review.  I suspect that this one is going to be a bit too light a color for me to use on a regular basis.  As for the author?  I liked the translation of War and Peace that was done in IIRC the 1950s by some Englishwoman (it was the Penguin edition) -- of course it also helped that I had previously seen the 4 hour train wreck of a movie on TV first, which basically was the "Cliffnotes" version (Henry Fonda was COMPLETELY miscast, IME, as Pierre, when I then read the novel).  But if I NEVER have to read Anna Karenina again?  It will be too soon....

@Sailor Kenshin -- So it wasn't just me who thought that this looked an awful lot like Noodler's Lermontov in the comparison image....

@lapis -- The ink was originally a burnt orange?  Fascinating!  Of course, now I'm wondering why Nathan Tardif made the change....  

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[InesF]

22 hours ago, yazeh said:

I recommend it, only to those, who have no sense of smell, love Tolstoy, like a challenging ink, are light handed, use well sealed wet pens and work under UV lights. 

I guess, that's a candidate for "Quote of the Year" 😄

 

Thank you @yazeh for taking the effort, for accepting the challenge, for passing through the headache time, for giving Tolstoy a second chance and finally, for taking one more photo under UV-light. That's a lot for a disliked ink! I'm impressed by your toughness and by your resistances! 

 

However, there is this incident with the cat and the water test. Why @yazeh, why the cat? Sure, you know your cat and maybe it likes the water (I doubt), but maybe even the cat doesn't like the ink?  

[yazeh]

11 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

@yazeh -- Thanks as usual for the review.

@inkstainedruth Most welcome!

 

11 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

 

 I suspect that this one is going to be a bit too light a color for me to use on a regular basis.

It's legible, but it's not worth all the above meant issues...

11 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

 

of course it also helped that I had previously seen the 4 hour train wreck of a movie on TV first, which basically was the "Cliffnotes" version (Henry Fonda was COMPLETELY miscast, IME, as Pierre, when I then read the novel).  But if I NEVER have to read Anna Karenina again?  It will be too soon....

I believe I saw, Prokofiev's, opera based on it, and besides a lovely love theme, the rest of it is forgotten.... As for Anna Karenina, I found out oppressive....

 

[yazeh]

58 minutes ago, InesF said:

I guess, that's a candidate for "Quote of the Year" 😄

 

58 minutes ago, InesF said:

 

Thank you @yazeh for taking the effort, for accepting the challenge, for passing through the headache time, for giving Tolstoy a second chance and finally, for taking one more photo under UV-light. That's a lot for a disliked ink! I'm impressed by your toughness and by your resistances! 

🙏

58 minutes ago, InesF said:

 

However, there is this incident with the cat and the water test. Why @yazeh, why the cat? Sure, you know your cat and maybe it likes the water (I doubt), but maybe even the cat doesn't like the ink?  

@InesF I wanted to give the cat the opportunity to be splashed by water and not affected, Like a water armour and the ink delivered

[Sailor Kenshin]

Though I DID have a cat that used to jump into the tub with me… 😜

[yazeh]

7 minutes ago, Sailor Kenshin said:

Though I DID have a cat that used to jump into the tub with me… 😜

That must have been some cat 😹

[Sailor Kenshin]

5 minutes ago, yazeh said:

That must have been some cat 😹

Sure was.  Her nickname was Her Imperial Majesty Of All She Surveys And More.

[inkstainedruth]

9 hours ago, yazeh said:

As for Anna Karenina, I found out oppressive....

One of my problems was that for a while I felt sorry for her husband, but he was such a schlub that eventually I didn't even care about HIM....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

[yazeh]

20 hours ago, Sailor Kenshin said:

Sure was.  Her nickname was Her Imperial Majesty Of All She Surveys And More.

Now that's one massive title

 

[yazeh]

15 hours ago, inkstainedruth said:

One of my problems was that for a while I felt sorry for her husband, but he was such a schlub that eventually I didn't even care about HIM....

Ruth Morrisson aka inkstainedruth

It's the worse thing when you lose interest in characters and wish that someone will put them out of miseries. I often times see in new movies churning out of streaming platforms. You wish the worse for all characters, before stopping the show midway

[Sailor Kenshin]

2 hours ago, yazeh said:

Now that's one massive title

 

It fit her massive personality.