Penmanship, Marksmanship, Craftsmanship and Mastery

It shouldn't take a Renaissance Man or a ‘proper lady to know how to write.' Penmanship skills are often regarded as irrelevant today, and while perhaps inevitable that's a shame.

“We're people, not machines. What if the Declaration of Independence had been written as an e-mail? How special or personal would that be. If you don't teach your child handwriting, the thoughts that they develop when they wish to communicate through a computer will vanish as soon as they have touched the keyboard.” Michael Sull, IAMPETH

Pens and pencils may well be antiquated tools but that makes something handwritten all the more significant. You don't have to be Austin Norman Palmer or a samurai master of Shodo to pen something important (luckily for me). It will be more time consuming than banging out something on a device, and it may well be cathartic. It could also be good for your brain and help you learn. Anyway, I like Jake Weidmann's style and I'd love to spend an afternoon chatting with Michael Sull.

I also wonder, as technology increases at an ever faster pace, if marksmanship will become as marginalized as penmanship.

I'd say I was happy I was given the opportunity to write this, but what was it Truman Capote said?

“That isn't writing at all, that's typing.”

If you're interested, Weidmann appeared at a TEDx event last year.