NANOWRIMO and Your Typewriter
NANOWRIMO and Your Typewriter
How Do You Pick the Best Machine for Speed?
I’ve never been a fan of NANOWRIMO, largely because I’m a rebel, a visionary, I don’t participate in trends, I START THE TREND. I will say I am competitive, so the only reason I might participate in NANOWRIMO is to beat someone in a word count, getting words down on the page. I love beating people at board games like Scrabble, SORRY! and Life, so if we’re going to duke it out over word counts, let’s get down to it.
And to participate in NANOWRIMO, it still needs to be fun. And spending more time on my laptop is not fun. Now NANOWRIMO on a typewriter would be fun, because I’d be busy tapping words out on the piece of paper (cotton or maybe computer print out paper), not backspacing and correcting misspellings like I’m doing now.
And the best typewriters for speed and ease of typing are the typebar electric machines, in my humble opinion. I’d be mispelling words all across the page, but by golly, I’d be hitting the word count easily. Here’s the thing on a laptop: I stress over each word, punctuation, to the point that I’m lucky if I get 400 words down in one writing session. (Now a good 400 words is much better than 1,000 lousy words that mean little, amount to gibberish. So there’s that.)
But NANOWRIMO is about getting words down on the page. So for the kind of typing that’s get typing across a piece of 8 1/2 x 11 piece of paper, single or double spaced, I vote for the Smith Corona Electra 120, similar to the machine that author Robert Caro uses for his books.
I love the Electra because you don’t have to hit the shift key to get an apostrophe. (You’d be surprised how you’ll use this key in one writing session). The space bar is automatic with one press of the finger. Likewise, you can hold down a letter key for the same effect across the page. If you want to use the color red on a bichrome black-and ribbon ribbon for effect, it’s a quick flick of a toggle on your keyboard.
That’s not all. The keys on the Electra are very touch sensitive. You lightly touch the letter T and the key strikes the page. (I think there’s a mechanism under the keyboard to change how sensitive the key strikes are, but I’ve yet to use it.)
The paper stand on the Electra is pretty handy. You know when you’re getting to the end of the page (unlike my sneaky Selectric, which doesn’t come with a paper stand). I vote for the Electra if it’s all about getting words down on the page. What’s more powerful than a pile of pages stacked next to you after a typing session? You can’t get that feeling of satisfaction with a laptop, that’s for sure. You can see your output. (It’s kind of like baking a pizza from scratch. You measure ingredients, roll out the dough, grate the cheese. Embellish your pizza. Bake. A short time later, you have the gratification of something far tastier than take-out or frozen from the grocery store.)
Here’s what I’ve gathered about NANOWRIMO in the past. In 2018, an antique typewriter collector used his 1942 Royal Commander for the month-long writing extravaganza. His first drafts always get finished faster on a typewriter than a computer, he said.
Another used his 958 Royal FPE. He said he actually types faster with it. He also shared that I “have learned to just push through the typos, to get the words on the page. It’s “liberating in a refreshing way, opposite to how the the little red ants underline of a typo on the computer seems to constrict.” He also shared that he planned to clean up typos in an OCR transcription.
Another writer planned to use his Hermes 3000 … along with other favorite machines during the month. I guess variety makes the typing and writing
One woman (bless her heart) planned to use her Selectric, in the same exact shade as mine. But her machine is a bigger beast than my desk size 721 model. She’ll get speed with her beast (if it’s working properly) but I don’t see a paper stand on her model. That might drive her nuts throughout the month.
So there you have it. Some writers use manual portables, desktop electrics. It’s whatever works for you.
So what typewriter are you using for NANOWRIMO? Please let me know in the comments what machine you’re using and why. I’m eager to hear.
