I’m not an expert on how the brain works, but I can say that, when writing by hand, one is continually solving a series of small problems having to do with the spacing of words, how letters are connected, the crossing of the letter t (sometimes more than one in the same word) and the dotting of the letters i and j, and how to accomplish all of those things through coordinated movements not just of the fingers but of the whole arm. All of that has to be integrated in real time with whatever is happening on a more abstract level in the brain’s processing of ideas and imagery.
Concurrently I have been following discourse on Reddit and other sources about how widespread use of AI has forced educators to return to the long-abandoned practice of having their students take exams in person by writing things out longhand in blue books. This has created new challenges for students who never really learned how to write by hand, and for teachers who can’t make sense of their students' terrible handwriting.
About twenty-five years ago I stopped composing at the keyboard and switched over to fountain pen on paper. Since then I have written many thousands of pages that way. The manuscript of The Baroque Cycle was a stack of handwritten pages 42 inches high, which for a time was on display at the Museum of Science Fiction in Seattle. With the exception of The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O., which I co-wrote with Nicole Galland by emailing Word files back and forth, every book I’ve written since then has been composed with fountain pen on paper.
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Here are some fairly simple dos and don’ts for people who want to reap the benefits of writing by hand.
I rarely write by hand anymore. I do all my writing on the Mac and, often, the phone. When on the phone, if it’s more than a few words, I’ll dictate rather than type.