[Henry Quince]

Graphologists say handwriting is not really HANDwriting but BRAINwriting. Your handwriting is individual to you, to your mind and personality. Your poems are brainwriting too, in another sense. Is it interesting to bring the two together? I’m always intrigued to hear recordings of authors reading their own work. Does handwriting, similarly, add another dimension to poetry on the page?

Some examples of famous poets in manuscript:

Keats: Lamia: http://englishhistory.net/marilee/lamiamanuscript.jpg

Wilfred Owen: Dulce et Decorum Est http://www.hcu.ox.ac.uk/jtap/images/...ascS/f318v.jpg

Poe: http://www.columbia.edu/acis/textarchive/rare/76a.gif

Hardy: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/british/images/vc206ap1.jpg

Frost: "Stopping by Woods..." http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/british/images/vc195c.jpg

Yeats: Wild Swans
http://www.english.upenn.edu/~bushne...als/yeats1.jpg

Eliot: http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/british/images/vc207a.jpg

Auden: Musee... http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/british/images/vc209.jpg

It’s a pity poets seldom go through the manuscript phase these days. I thought it would make an interesting exercise, combining poetry and art elements, to produce a “fair copy” manuscript poem (preferably your own) and show the image here.

So — write one of your poems out (maybe a short one) in your handwriting, then scan it into your computer, make a jpg file, and post it here. (Scan it for screen display, not print, or you’ll have to resize it to fit here.)

Winner by popular vote?

[Henry Quince]

I’ll post one of mine to set the bar low initially. You’ll easily do better than this. Maybe we have some calligraphers out there?

[Marion Shore]

Henry,

This is a wonderful idea. It was fascinating looking at all those examples you posted-- seeing the handwritten versions really personalizes the poets, doesn't it?

I loved seeing yours; the artwork was a really beautiful touch. It's a lovely poem too.

Here is a page from a handwritten manuscript by Petrarch, which contains a drawing of his in the margin.

[Marion Shore]

[Mary Meriam]

Thanks for this thread Henry! I love handwriting. I had this already scanned in. It isn't a fair copy, though, it's just a draft of an unfinished sonnet.

[Suzanne Delaney]

Hi Henry:
This is a really nice idea. I recently started a personal journal of my poetry and combined it with rubberstamp art.
The first one is a poem written under an illustration of
a stamped image that tries to capture the essence of the speaker in the poem (me) talking about her death (way in the future, of course )





[This message has been edited by Suzanne Delaney (edited June 18, 2006).]

[Suzanne Delaney]

(continued from previous post) The poem is written under the face illustration and opens by a black cardboard hinge to reveal the words.



Blue flowers -fragments of sky
notions, emotions
Forget-me-nots sigh
Bring me blue flowers
when I die.
Suzanne Delaney

[This message has been edited by Suzanne Delaney (edited June 18, 2006).]

[Suzanne Delaney]

Marion:
Your Isolde poem is beautiful- love the shipwrecked sheets.
Aloha,
Suzanne