You know a typewriter is being used as flimsy filler decoration when it’s sitting on a shelf and simultaneously serving as a book support.
A real writer’s typewriter is free and clear so that the carriage can move its full length.
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Chris Aldrich
I'm a biomedical and electrical engineer with interests in information theory, complexity, evolution, genetics, signal processing, IndieWeb, theoretical mathematics, and big history. I'm also a talent manager-producer-publisher in the entertainment industry with expertise in representation, distribution, finance, production, content delivery, and new media. View all posts by Chris Aldrich
You know a typewriter is being used as flimsy filler decoration when it’s sitting on a shelf and simultaneously serving as a book support.
A real writer’s typewriter is free and clear so that the carriage can move its full length.
You know a typewriter is being used as flimsy filler decoration when it’s sitting on a shelf and simultaneously serving as a book support.
A real writer’s typewriter is free and clear so that the carriage can move its full length.
Honestly, respectfully, who fucking cares. It’s obviously a set, not someone’s home/office.
Even if it was, do you expect everyone who owns and uses a typewriter to have it out on a desk ready to go all the time? Mine is being used to weigh down a lamp when I don’t need it because it’s large and unwieldy to have out and on a surface. When I need it I pull it out and I put it back out of the way when I’m done.
And add a middle column to that bookcase before the whole thing saggs/snaps to the floor.
@chrisaldrich Can a working typewriter be rigged to be stowable like a sewing machine in a pivot topped cabinet? Or is that too eccentric and one should just get a roll-top desk?
And you're right, that typewriter in the conversation background bookcase looks decorative rather than deployable.
Early and mid-century desk manufacturers had both flip top desks and cabinet door/spring loaded platform desks for large standard typewriters so that you could hide them away when not in use. Examples:
I’ve even seen people use sewing machine desks for typing: https://www.reddit.com/r/typewriters/comments/1oij547/i_turned_an_old_sewing_table_into_a_typing_desk/
Can hear the creaking from here.
Maybe they’ll write a story about the day the shelves gave way under the weight of all those unread books.
But not at home obviously, coffee shop is where the work is done.
One of mine is in a case and the other sits under my work bench. Don’t have the space to just keep it out but when I want to use it or work on it I bring it out. In my opinion a real writer is someone who is devoted to it regardless of space, settings and so on. We don’t all start out with a dream office setup. Gotta start somewhere.
Why not? I have a lot of books and a lot of typewriters.
I have more typewriters than books, so I use books to support typewriters.
This snobby gatekeeping shit is annoying.
You think he’s typing with that there? I keep my SF on a book shelf propping books up to either side.
And all my typewriters have a carriage lock on them. Am I not REALLY a typewriter user because I engage the carriage lock? ITS NOT FREE AND CLEAR OH NO.
The typewriter isn’t on a surface that’s appropriate for writing. It’s either purely for decoration or it gets moved when it gets used.
You know typewriters are really being used to inflate someone’s flimsy ego and not as a serious writing mechanism when they feel the need to dictate how other people use theirs.
I have ones that I keep free for writing, and some that are more ‘decorative’
oh no, this guy is using a typewriter for another useful purpose, arrest him
I’m gonna go out on a limb and guess the vast majority of the books on those shelves are filler as well. (They look like out of date encyclopaedias & random “fancy” looking hardbacks you can get cheaply at library book sales).
I’m most distressed by the lack of structural support for the shelves at all.
Also, want to note that I have about 5-10 typewriters kicking around & only two actually work, so the ones that don’t work get used as decor until I have time/space/money to get them functioning (been carting around a first gen electricified IBM that has never worked for a couple decades now).
If the video were a typewriting specific topic, that would make using it as a prop an issue. As it is, it’s whatever.
Okay, but what is wrong with using typewriters as decor? I mean, its a filmset, hes talking about writing (or at least thats what you said, idk him or his podcast), so a typewriter and books as decorations make sense. If he doesnt have to be able to use this specific typewriter often, i dont see why it cant sit on a shelf and hold up some books
I use one of my typewriters to press and dry some four leaf clovers atm.
I bet you’re fun at parties….
I have a typewriter propping up decorations, it’s the first one I was ever given by my best friend, but the escapement is damaged and not feasible to repair, I keep it around anyway, maybe it’s the same here, maybe not, who cares
https://www.reddit.com/r/typewriters/comments/1oilrro/comment/nlwjell/?context=3 The carriage is free to move its full length. A flimsy typewriter hangs decorating a ladies’ hairdressing salon as wall art. The customers, in various states of repair, were carefully cropped out of the photo. Unlike the machine; I didn’t hang around.
And the books look like crappy thrifted encyclopedias, so meh.
I think you mean “Bookend”. When I was in the used book trade we derisively called the books on that shelf “decorator books”.