Shakespeare's Dilemma

Inspired by the wonderful sketches shared at Moleskinerie, I finally succumbed to buying my first moleskine....without lines. As an ardent disciple of the mantra "stay between the lines" in my journaling over the years, I seem to be more comfortable writing in a ruled journal rather than face the challenge of a truly blank page. Since I paint using words, it seemed unnecessary and somewhat frightening to lose the safety of those lines.

Perhaps it's that bane of all writers, to be stuck "staring at a blank page," that kept me buying ruled journals all these years. Somehow I always count those printed lines as page occupants, thus preventing my mind from seeing blank pages...or perhaps I thought the lined pages more accepting of my handwriting. Working past all that I still hesitated to change my process, even as I purchased my new blue-banded beauty...yet the stirring of my suppressed internal sketcher could be ignored no longer.

The last time I remember using a blank journal was several decades ago while in architecture school at UT Austin. I was a high-school architecture prodigy of sorts, and my initial exposure to "real world" architectural studies was a humbling experience. Blank sketch books were de rigueur of my first architectural drawing class, and while I can't remember the brand, I do remember the frustrations associated with those unruly blank pages. The first day we assembled in a campus courtyard to sketch stately oak trees. When the TA started to define the assignment, it sounded so simple, so basic, so "why aren't we doing some serious sketching." But to our collective surprise, he prohibited us from actually drawing the tree. Our assignment was to draw the voids existing between branches, and thus by sketching the tree's nothingness we'd in essence define its reality. Despite the Zen-like appeal, my logical mind imploded, and noting the expressions of my fellow students it seemed I wasn't alone. After that assignment, I had hoped such absurdity would be atypical and we'd soon be sketching the marvelous edifices that populated the campus. Hope proved fleeting, however, as the following week we met to sketch the modernistic use of brick, tile, and stainless steel in a campus dorm lobby. And as suspected, our Zen TA intoned that we were NOT to draw the walls, fountain, or sculpture, but instead the shadows that defined the space.

These long-forgotten experiments in abstract interpretation and forced out-of-the-box thinking came as flashbacks when I started working the blank, rule-less pages of my new moleskine. In the two weeks since, I admit to enjoying the unrestricted writing freedom these creamy empty pages allow. Maybe it's the release from the bondage of lines that usually define my pen's path or perhaps the freshness of form in a familiar process that's contributing to feeling like a kid with a new toy. And although the hidden artist has yet to appear, for the moment I'm content knowing my fountain pen could smoothly move from verb to vision when the sketcher does finally awaken. Other than the doodle I placed on the owner's page (ala Vonnegut), I'm determined to include several sketches before I finish this volume and face that gut-wrenching decision: to rule, or not to rule...that will most definitely be the question.

Gary Varner
Inkmusings.com

Photo courtesy of the author

Comments

[m]

I utterly loathe lined notebooks so I either get the blank ones or the squared ones. Both of these can be turned 45 degrees to give you an A4ish size page to write on.

The slightly bigger sized moleskine makes a good journal which doesn't end up weighing a ton in my bag.

I sometimes wonder if I should be concerned at how violently I react aginst having to write in other peoples lines... when I was faciliting Artist Way groups people seemed to find it quite liberating/transgressive to write against the lines/across the lines/outside the lines.

There is a lot of school baggage people are hanging on to.

[Armand]

"I utterly loathe lined notebooks..."

Can't use them either. Must have something to do with childhood "don't write-beyond-the line" trauma^_^.

[Lorianne]

Hmmmm, am I the only Moleskiner who *needs* the lines? I'm a lefty, so my writing slants all over the place: for there to be any hope of me being able to READ what I write, there have to be lines...

But then again, I can't draw, so lines are comforting: "Don't worry, little un-artistic one. This is a notebook, not a Scary Sketchbook!"

Nice post, Gary. Loved the idea of drawing the space around the tree limbs. Annie Dillard, actually, refers to this image a couple of times: once in Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, I believe, and again in one of her poems.

Actually, I once saw a picture of her rough draft for the moth essay in Holy the Firm: she doodles all over her margins. (Can't remember if the page was lined or not...) Damn. Gonna have to learn me how to draw...

[Lohr]

I have to agree about blank pages. A blank page does make one all too aware of one's lack of drawing skills, and even using a blank page to write can be disheartening, given the inevitable meandering course of lines. As lovely as blank page can be, there's a certain safety and comfort in ruled or (better) squared pages...

[Mike]

I don't use lined notebooks but not because of any philosophical jailing of my inner creative spirit. I like to draw my little stupid doodles anywhere and everywhere and drawing against lines just doesn't do it for me.

Edward Tufte (www.edwardtufte.com) talks a lot about having too much junk on a piece of paper. Lined and graph paper should have lines you can just barely see, just enough to give you the guide you need. Moleskines aren't real obnoxious like our old school loose leaf notebook paper was but the lines are quite clear even when you've written over them.

My handwriting is sloppy, however, and for my daily journal (I realize with horror that I have seven current Moleskines I am working in, quite a commitment) I used a lined notebook instead of unlined. Generally, however, I used the unlined notebook and the unlined sketchbook for more permanent work.

[gary]

"...I realize with horror that I have seven current Moleskines I am working in, quite a commitment..."

I thought my two Moleskines and three standard journals a bit compulsive. Guess you've given me inspiration to go get a few more Moleskines... like I need encouragement when it comes to buying anything even faintly resembling office supplies...

[Michael]

Call me crazy, but I like the ruled pages. I don't think I could keep my lines straight if they weren't there, and as far as them being someones else's lines, it is my notebook and they are my lines.

What I'm really not sure of is squared paper. What's the point? If one cares to utilize it as a sketchbook, wouldn't blank pages be more convenient? If one wanted to use lined paper, then why not use the lined paper?

I just passed up a good deal on three squared, pocket-sized moleskines for just this reason. It just doesn't seem kosher.

M

[Sparks]

Well, squared paper can be handy if you tend to doodle mathematics in your moleskine. Or if you do more graphs than sketches.

So I use a squared one for my work notebook, and a blank one for my training notebook. I'm thinking now though that personal journals and so forth are better off blank. It just... fits better with the idea of trying to write about unstructured experiences.