Sunday, November 24, 2013

NaNoWriMo ReDo

November is National Novel Writing Month; or NaNoWriMo, for those in the know. Now in its 14th year, NoNoWriMo originated to encourage creative writing "from anyone who has ever thought fleetingly about writing a novel" according to their website. The goal is to complete 50,000 words or less in 30 days. 
     Rob Bowker of the entertaining Typewriter Heaven blog in the UK, recently checked in from the Typosphere to send me his own surrogate version inspired by this annual event. He created his first NaNo typewritten book (NaNoTyBo?), The Micro-Book Typed, and completed it by the 4th of November.



Typing on a 1950s Olivetti Lexikon at 12 characters per inch leaves little room for a wordy text, so Bowker wisely chose to just write a DIY textbook of sorts, on how to type a 16-page book using only a single sheet of paper. Written in concise language, he answers the questions of Why and How to go about typing a small book on a typewriter. Bowker, who frequently types blog posts on one of his many typewriters, also provides helpful hints on formatting monospaced text and creating illustrations using characters, pattern and texture. The Micro-Book Typed is currently available from Issuu as a free downloadable PDF ready to print, fold, stitch and trim. Bowker suggests more of his typewritten chapbooks, possibly with spreads and even illustrations, may be in the pipeline soon.

In more recent posts, Bowker offers a number of other downloadable PDFs of some fun DIY typewriter "Graphikubes" from his personal collection. As an added bonus, he also suggests a beer-of-the-day in many of his frequent posts—though not certain if he advocates drinking while typing however. 



This gif was made by Ryan (Magic Margin) Adney within an hour after Bowker 
originally posted his first typewritten micro-book. 

1 comment:

  1. Unless there's a likelihood of compromising a belief or a recovery programme, I most certainly advocate drinking beer (in moderation) while typing. It lubricates the keyboard. Many thanks for the gracious post.

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