Punctuated by a ding...

I feel like crying.

Or at least sighing…heavily.

I feel like it’s the end of an era, which I suppose it is.

Like the last majestic beast of its kind in the world has finally popped its clogs, which it has.

I learned yesterday, via best-selling Crime Writer Ed Lynskey (thanks Ed), right here on Linkedin, that the last manual typewriter factory left in the world (it’s in Mumbai) is closing its doors.

Forever.

The last one in the whole bloody world!

News like this should at least have a dramatic piece of music to accompany it. Something from a Hitchcock movie, perhaps.

Something shocking.

Possibly accompanied by a sharp intake of breath and a wide-eyed stare.

Punctuated by a ding.

It feels like the kind of event that, one day, will be spoken about by old writers sitting round open fires and drinking rotgut whisky.

Remembering the way things used to be done.

With muscle power, ribboned ink, reams of paper, the odour of cleaning oil, and the noise of small, thin, mechanical arms moving in a comforting rhythm.

Remembering a time when typewriters were typewriters.

When they were works of art. Helping to create other works of art.

From the Remington Noiseless beast of Faulkner…to the famed, battered lightweight, Olivetti Lettera 32 of Cormac McCarthy.

And me.

I have three of them. Not one of the buggers can write as well as McCarthy’s. Not even in the same universe.

It takes physical and mental effort to write anything worth shit with a manual typewriter.

Ever since I ran out of ribbons, I write solely on my Mac. I love it, of course. But it only takes mental effort. Lots of it.

Sometimes I like hearing the cogs go round on the outside, as well as on the inside.

My Mac is quietly digital…and I still hanker after a noisy analogue session every now and then.

Just to make the neighbours talk.

Just to balance things out.

Electricity and silicon chips have made the ‘doing’ bit too damned easy on the hands and heads.

And as my old tooth-pulling grandad used to say…if it comes out easy, you’re doing it wrong.

There should be blood and pain involved. There should be aching pinkie fingers and throbbing migraines.

There should be split fingernails and frayed tempers.

There should be well-thumbed dictionaries. Not instant spellcheckers. Many crossings out. Not autocorrect. Bins full of screwed up paper balls. Not screens wiped clean as if by magic.

Perspiration as well as inspiration.

Heights of joy as well as depths of despair.

There should be evidence of bloody effort.

At least for the first draft.

Maybe before they lock up shop and throw away the keys, they’ll have a closing down sale.

I wonder how much a flight would be from Manchester to Mumbai.

By turboprop airliner, of course…