In a word. . . handwriting

Handwriting is soon to be no more, if you are to believe those who know everything. Nowadays the keyboard is king/queen, even in the classroom.

Too late for my family and friends. In the days before email my nearest and dearest used dread getting any correspondence from me. All those hours required to decipher what I might have meant. Usually, they would wait until I arrived home or visited.

It has been a lifelong problem. Indeed at secondary school I earned the unique distinction of being the first in my class – in first year – to be wigged by our then English teacher who was, let it be said, a serial wigger.

It meant catching you by whatever locks you had at that stage and pulling you to your feet by tugging at them forcefully. Even if you were already standing he would attempt to detach your head from your spine.

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In the instance it was wholly deserved. He had given us an essay to write in a previous class and, as was his wont, asked one of us to get up and read his masterpiece. On the day I was the chosen one.

I rose in a state of horror, anticipating what was about to happen. And it did. I could not read my own handwriting. Hell was it to be on my feet in that hour, but to be confronted by my own handwriting was, well, very bad indeed.

The punishment was swift and unforgettable.

My handwriting however remained miserable. As a reporter it had some advantages as no one else could read my notes. Problems arose, however, when that might include myself. So I resorted early to recording equipment.

Finland has already dropped handwriting from its schools' curriculum, while in the US many states have done so too. In 2016, US professor Anne Trubek, in her book The History and Uncertain Future of Handwriting, said it had lost its position as our primary means of communication and that it was time to move on.

To those who worried about the loss of handwriting, she said that “in the 6,000 years since humans have been writing” people have had “the same anxieties and fears with each change.” Her message, in that direct US way, was a simple – “get over it”. Or, rather, “get a keyboard”.

Write, from Old English writtan, "to set down in writing".

inaword@irishtimes.com