The dying Handwriting, or an Art in making ?

I was thinking about the days when we used to take the red and black striped Natraj pencil in our hands and fill pages of the notebook with assignments from the school. Sharpening the pencil was a task in its own. If the regular sharpener won't help I would take help of the blunted shaving blade to do the filing. All this for some good hand writing. We knew that handwriting was the first thing an examiner would notice about the student.

Then came the fountain pen. Since this was given to students in class four and above (if I remember correctly) it was a prestige thing. But writing was again a challenge with those occasional leakages and drippings of the pen, inside the pocket or within the bag. Or sometimes simply in the hands, on the notebook. Not to forget the broken nibs. This did not help to improve the handwriting aspect of it for a long time. Instead it worsened it. Some years later we were allowed to use the ball pens. We could again write at great speeds without fearing about a broken nib or a torn notebook. For me it had all the good features of the pencil and the fountain pen. If the ball pen was a Reynolds the written essays looked even better.

All the while in the school and to some extent in the college, stress was laid on the need for us to develop a good handwriting. Never did I think that if it was really needed after college.

Most of us do not use the pen more than for scribbling occasional notes in the office pad. In recent past I remember using a pen for longest duration while writing essays for some college application. Now since the many of the forms are available online I am not sure where else can we use the pen? Unless you are a creative person who likes to fill pages with some creative literature you may fall in my category of people loosing the need of a pen. Signing the bank cheques is what we still use the pen for - unless you always rely on electronic funds transfer.

So where does it all lead to? Technology advances very rapidly. Electronic notebooks may be available in all private schools in two decades or maybe in lesser time. Students will be completing their assignments and taking examinations on the same. On the e-notebook, all scribbled text will be converted to computer generated text. Writing on paper using a pen or pencil may become obsolete.

Now also we hardly use the pen outside our education years and with the advent of electronic notebooks in schools and colleges the pen, as a tool for writing, may become totally redundant. There may be a subject called Handwriting for initial classes where the students will be taught to write just as an art. Yes, after losing all its practical importance hand-written language will become an art, just like painting. Possibly any hand-written text from a known artist will be framed and hung in the living room :) .

Does this mean handwriting is dying? I feel, it is though I’m not sure how much time will this complete process takes. A guess - may be half a century. But good thing is that it is not dying because of any negligence or apathy. It is dying because we have evolved, moved ahead. It will still remain as an art and be practiced by enthusiasts for centuries.