The Benefits of Typing

California Typewriter is a 2016 documentary about typewriters, named for a typewriter repair and servicing shop in Berkeley, California, that went out of business just before the pandemic. In the documentary, you’ll see people shopping for typewriters, servicing typewriters, and fixing typewriters. You’ll see Tom Hanks’ collection of typewriters. You’ll see John Mayer writing songs on his typewriter and Sam Shepard writing plays on his. By the time you finish watching, you’ll long for a typewriter to call your own.

I recommend watching the documentary–it’s a wonderful exploration of the mystique and whimsy of typewriters. With the loss of typewriters as a mainstream writing implement, we’ve lost other things as well. But I wanted to share with you two sets of clips from the documentary because they go to the benefits of typing versus keyboarding for a writer.

This clip in particular is valuable for writers–John Mayer discusses the ways typing has transformed his songwriting process, in part by preventing him from editing as he writes:

I also love this clip of Sam Shepard discussing his reasons for using a typewriter. An actor, playwright, poet, and short story writer, Shepard has been one of my favorite writers for close to forty years. I named my blog, “The Write Stuff,” in honor of the first movie I saw him in. In this clip, he talks about the way typing is more artistic than keyboarding–picture the splash of ink on the page. I love that he also validates an old writing saw we hear often, which is to stop writing while you’re hot and save something for the next day. From Shepard’s mouth, it becomes more gospel than cliché:

You can read more about the documentary at its website, californiatypewritermovie.com. The documentary is available for purchase, but it is also streaming on Peacock and, I’m sure, other streaming services. It has a 100% Tomatometer score on Rotten Tomatoes and an 83% audience score. You can also read about the closure of California Typewriter in Berkeleyside: Berkeley’s California Typewriter, star of documentary, closes shop.