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Handwriting of the Twentieth Century
By Rosemary Sassoon Intellect Ltd
Copyright © 2007 Rosemary Sassoon
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-84150-991-4
CHAPTER 1
The influences on contemporary handwriting
A historical perspective
THIS BOOK IS primarily concerned with the twentieth century. However, there cannot be a precise starting date when dealing with handwriting copy books or teaching methods. What was being taught in 1900 was a result of the circumstances and publications of half a century earlier. Teachers were influenced by their own parents and teachers. Older books would still be in use or republished in new editions. This point is illustrated by data from a national survey of handwriting undertaken in 1956 by Reginald Piggott (see p101). He recorded that, of those who answered his questionnaire, 43% still wrote a Civil Service hand. For that matter a considerable amount of people still do today. The Civil Service model is a simplified form of Copperplate handwriting. It was introduced into Great Britain in the 1860s and began to be replaced in schools during the 1920s and increasingly so from the 1930s onwards (see the table opposite).
Contemporary handwriting can trace its origins through the history of letters and writing implements from Roman times and beyond. A short explanation is needed to link more recent changes in letterforms with the development of pens over the centuries, as well as the alterations in educational thinking and the changing priorities for handwriting itself. British attitudes have been markedly different from those in other parts of the world. Traditionally, British schools have been allowed to develop their own teaching policies. Whole districts, as well as individual schools, have been free to choose their own models and methods of teaching handwriting, or even to neglect the subject altogether. This situation has resulted in considerable controversy. At the same time it provides a rich field for investigating the effects of different models and methods within the same educational environment.
Some European countries, as well as the USA, and Canada, still cling to their Copperplate-based models of a century ago. Tradition, and maybe a sense of national identity, has so far prevented them from taking advantage of the speed and efficiency of simpler models. Others have diversified only in the last decade or so, contributing various simplified models for future discussion.
A long and sometimes sorry story
The renowned paleographer, Professor Julian Brown, contributed a short history of English handwriting to the Journal of the Society for Italic Handwriting in 1972. He subtitled his review of cursive handwriting 'A long and sometimes sorry story'. He began: 'The successive cursive scripts of Western Europe have all been generated out of set scripts by the need to write quickly: pen-lifts have been eliminated, and new letter-forms have evolved more or less automatically. Once in being, the cursives have been promoted from the world of day-to-day affairs and correspondence into the formal worlds of the book and the solemn diploma; and when this has happened, they, no less than the set scripts, have been subjected to stylization, systematization and elaboration'.
Brown continued: 'The elaborated forms of cursive have eventually had to be abandoned, either for practical purposes or aesthetic reasons, and in every case handwriting has been reformed through a return to a version, generally a modified version, of some earlier script which seemed to lack the vices of its descendants. The long slow progress towards the reasonable goal of a fully cursive handwriting in which almost every letter could be made without a pen lift and in which every letter could, if the writer wished, be joined to every other letter, has been interrupted by a combination of two factors: the fatal tendency towards systematization and elaboration, and a hardly less regrettable tendency to over-correct when choosing a model from the past. Hence the sadness'.
Professor Brown's comments are particularly valuable because so many of those versed in the history and practice of letterforms seem to confuse the everyday with the formal. Alfred Fairbank, the calligrapher who contributed so much to the revival of italic handwriting, briefly charted the history of handwriting from earliest Sumerian Cuneiform, via Egypt, and China, into Latin scripts in his Story of Handwriting. When describing events in Great Britain he discussed Copperplate and briefly print script. The emphasis of the second part of his book, however, was on the history and practice of the italic hand. He believed this to be the ideal model for all purposes, in education and beyond. Like several authors who followed him in the middle of the century, personal stylistic preferences tended to get in the way of a balanced history of everyday handwriting. They tended to use history selectively to justify their preferred model.
Desmond Flower, who wrote a brief survey of English handwriting in the letterform journal, Signature, in 1936, was another influential exponent of italic handwriting. He took a slightly different view of history and began in an informal way: 'It is frequently taken for granted that letterforms, like golf clubs or easy chairs, have always been much the same, except in some far off age which bears no relation to our own. We are delighted by early manuscripts which gleam in gold and rich colours within the glass cases of every museum, but these marvels are so remote from us that they might have been penned by the man in the moon. Yet an unbroken chain of history links such ancient mysteries to the painful letters which our housemaid grinds out when she signs for a registered parcel.' Flower explained how: 'The form of hand which Western man writes today, springs with few exceptions from the cancelleresca corsiva, or chancery cursive which was adopted by Eugenius IV (1431–1447). He interpreted its introduction this way: 'It was a reactionary hand. The Florentine scribes of the Renaissance, impeccable in their taste as were most Italians in that remarkable age, no longer cared for the writing of their forefathers, which had become debased, full of marks and symbols which symbolised nothing. They turned back to the purer Caroline letters of the eleventh century for inspiration'. Flower then gave a detailed account of the beauty of this new writing which evolved into the italic form as we now know it. Flower recounted that this form was fixed when Francesco da Bologna was employed by Aldus to cut a new type which was said to be based on the handwriting of Petrarch.
In 1936 Flower, like many other contemporaries in literary or artistic fields, was dissatisfied with contemporary Copperplate-based handwriting. He continued: 'Today the time has come once again when we should put our house in order and turn back three hundred years as the scribes of Renaissance Italy did'. Not surprisingly, Flower deplored eighteenth-century writing, believing that the last link with Renaissance Italy was broken when looped ascenders were adopted. He finished by explaining how: 'In many walks of life a sense of utilitarianism is lacking where it is most needed, but the problem of handwriting is curiously the reverse. It is simple for anyone to write and it is, indeed, a necessity. Handwriting would be far better if it were not so much part of our life, for now we form letters as we make casual conversation and think nothing of where we are at'.
Some sixty years later we probably need just the kind of writing that Flower so disliked – multi-purpose, personal letters that we can use without concentrating too much on their style. In addition, what may be desirable and admirable in an adult hand, may not always be the most suitable model for the young learner. But history is useful. Those who ignore the history and implications of letterforms are ill-equipped to design models for children today, while those with informed attitudes and open minds can take what is best from the past and harness it for use in the modern world.
Issues to balance in handwriting
Handwriting is a complex and emotive issue. It is difficult to be objective about a subject on which many of us hold strong personal views. In presenting a history it is not easy to strike a balance between being critical but fair at the same time. It must be done in such a way that readers are able to judge for themselves the effects of the various models and methods that appear in this book, bearing in mind the other contemporary issues. The way these various factors interact seems to be the key to understanding how this historical survey might be of practical use today.
To start with, the different priorities for the task of writing need to be balanced against each other. Some of the factors have remained constant since the earliest writing systems evolved, but there are others which are more evident today.
• The most important balance is between clarity and speed. In general the faster you write the less legible it will be. There are some occasions when speed is more necessary than absolute clarity, and others when legibility is of utmost importance.
• Secondly comes the balance between the needs of the reader and the needs of the writer. This concerns the respective requirements of the eye for recognition, and the comfort of the hand that writes (especially at speed). It also involves a balance between the writer's need to get enough down on paper and to keep up with a train of thought, with the reader's expectation (often perceived as a right) to be presented with neat work.
• The third balance is between beauty and practicality. This can be a balance between the readers' and writers' tastes or demands, or concern only the writers' wish to produce what they perceive as an aesthetic presentation. This is likely to be at some cost to length or content.
• A more recent balance is between the time-consuming skill training and the need to use writing creatively at an early age. This has become an important issue for curriculum planners.
The first reaction to a model may be whether it is pleasing or not to the viewer, but this may not be relevant in educational terms. When judging models it is necessary to consider how well the model relates to the writing implement, the needs of the writer who will use it, and whether it will develop into a suitable script, bearing in mind the educational and social climate of the age in which it was, or will be, used. How easy it might be to teach or acquire needs thought, as well as whether any particular script would be capable of being developed in such a way as to satisfy those who wish to acquire (or be presented with) aesthetically beautiful writing.
A new model, however attractive, proves nothing by itself. The designer's claims for its supposed success are not enough, nor are the perfect examples of pupils' work that are usually available to promote the benefits of almost any model. Most obedient and diligent children can be taught, at a young age, to reproduce almost any letterforms by a determined teacher. Once automated, and closely adhered to over a period of time, only the strongest (and maybe the creative and rebellious) characters are likely break the mould of a strictly enforced model and find a mature, personal hand which suits their personalities and fits their specific needs. By the time they are free to write as they wish, it may be too late for them to experiment and find the short cuts which lead to a fast personal writing. Therefore, what is claimed as a benefit of keeping to any particular model may in the end be of detriment to the writer.
The proof of a good model lies in whether a large variety of children are able to develop fluent, legible, personal handwriting from learning it. Where the ductus (the movement within and between letters) of the model is faulty, the resulting script may be unable to join easily or speed up. It is unlikely to retain legibility at speed. A model that involves inessential details will produce inefficient, fussy writing. This is likely to deteriorate further at speed.
Wherever possible, poor examples of children's writing as well as good ones must be examined to compare and contrast the effects of different letterforms. It is just as important for a model to work well with low achievers as with high achievers. Examples of mature scripts arising from the various models are equally useful (if not vital) in judging the long-lasting effects of models. Some examples relating to specific models appear throughout this book.
It is difficult to give firm guidelines for good or bad handwriting. It would need a huge range of examples to give other than a selective view of something that depends so much on the tastes and the eye of the perceiver. In 1952 Wilfrid Blunt wrote in his book Sweet Roman Hand: 'All good hands, in so far as they adhere reasonably closely to the accepted forms of the Roman and Italic founts, show a certain amount of similarity; all bad hands diverge in their own particular way from the norm, thus acquiring what some people allege to be character'. Yet character, along with legibility, efficiency, consistency and an ability to speed up, produces the handwriting we need today. When it comes to bad handwriting other factors intervene. The writer's level of education, maturity or even health, can influence the written trace, while severe tension, from whatever cause, can distort good writing at any age. Neither model nor method should then be blamed for poor handwriting – nor even the writer.
Pens, pen holds and the resulting letterforms
Writing masters of the sixteenth century understood that there was a relationship between the writing implement, the prescribed pen hold and the resulting letterforms. When the pen altered, as has happened frequently in the last few centuries, and drastically in the past few decades, then there might be a need to alter the pen hold. These changes would be likely to affect the letterforms. When a model altered it might require a different pen hold and be best reproduced with a particular writing implement. When judging a model it is important to bear these points in mind. When designing a model it is even more important. Teachers in centuries past were more accustomed to considering such points, building on what they had been taught in their own school days. It is only in more recent years that such matters have been so ignored that copy sheets alone may be insufficient to enable teachers, who themselves were not taught adequate strategies, to teach handwriting. Today many books on handwriting seem to suggest that there is only one correct way of holding the pen or pencil. A review of some classic pen holds illustrates how hand positions and pen hold have consistently altered to match new models and implements.
At the beginning of the century many young children practised their letters on a slate with either a slate 'pencil' or chalk. When a mistake occurred it was easy to erase and alter. A hundred years ago many children graduated from pencil to using pointed steel nibs. This was a nightmare for the unwary Copperplate writer. A sudden blot would spoil a careful piece of work. As the Civil Service models became fashionable, with less pronounced gradations of thick and thin strokes, slightly less pointed steel nibs became available, including the aptly named relief nibs. The problems of watery or sticky pots of ink still stood in the way of good writing. The ink monitor had a responsible job in the age of the dip-pen. This was described in Whalley's book, Writing Implements and Accessories. Gordon and Mock reminded us in 1960, in their book Twentieth Century Handwriting, that, despite all these difficulties, attitudes in education alter slowly: 'When inexpensive fountain pens came into use in the 1920s they were banned in almost every school, and few children were ever taught to write with them. Now ball points suffer the same fate'.
When the pointed quill or metal nib was used for Copperplate-based letterforms the hand was not placed firmly on the writing surface as it is today. The hand rested lightly on the desk, usually supported only by the little finger, in order to exert the changing pressure that produced alternate thick down and thin upstrokes. This light pressure also enabled the whole hand to glide easily along the line and write long words without lifting the pen. To stop in the middle of a word usually resulted in an unsightly ink blot.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from Handwriting of the Twentieth Century by Rosemary Sassoon. Copyright © 2007 Rosemary Sassoon. Excerpted by permission of Intellect Ltd.
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