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The Case for Writing Longhand: ‘It’s About Trying to Create That Little Space of Freedom’

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2022-01-22 03:30:07

Times Insider explains who we are and what we do, and delivers behind-the-scenes insights into how our journalism comes together.

Sam Anderson’s home office in Beacon, N.Y., is a palace of longhand. There are paragraphs scrawled inside the covers of books. Words are wedged into the corners of ripped-open envelopes. His looping script snakes its way down notepads — and there are piles of filled ones.

Mr. Anderson, a staff writer for The New York Times Magazine, is one of at least two writers at The Times who draft stories by hand, a time-consuming process that reporters operating on daily deadlines might consider impractical.

“It definitely carries a certain amount of privilege,” said Mr. Anderson, who, as a long-form writer free from the pressure of daily deadlines, writes an average of three 5,000- to 10,000-word pieces for the magazine each year.

Mr. Anderson, 44, said he grew up writing by hand, before the computer was common in American households. He likes that the process slows him down and puts him in touch with his thoughts. Drafting by hand lowers the stakes, he said, because it doesn’t feel like “official” writing yet, which helps him avoid writer’s block.