Excellent essay on writing by hand by Kevin Hartnett at The Millions. An extract:
Overall I think there’s greater variance in the quality of the writing I produce by hand. The good stuff I write is cleaner, more honest, less stylized, more well-considered. The bad stuff is more obvious, more ponderous, more self-involved, maybe weirder… Writing on the computer drives my writing towards some average value — I think/write/delete/think/write until I have something that’s decent but maybe less vibrant than the ideas… conceived in my head.
Do you write by hand? Is it a better way to write?
I’ve found that if I write by hand, I’m less likely to get distracted by all of the shiny things on my computer. I also think it gives me an extra chance to revise, because I notice little things that I need to fix as I’m typing it up.
“Shiny things on the computer”: I totally get you. I love my computer and the web, but, man, I can lose a couple of hours to messing with it real quick… When I’m writing, it’s best for me to be completely off the Internet the whole time…