Invent a Writing Technology

Invent a Writing Technology

“And-O Tempora! O Mores!-to lose the soft warm touch of sheepskin, the knowledge that some lamb chop had died to create this beloved writing surface! Let us weep.” (Tribble& Trubek, pg. 9) Some of us may have wept over this project, weeping over how might to do this writing project. Many of us succeeded in coming up with a unique way to write with natural materials, a few of us cheated to by using limited technology and some of us failed to do the project. All of benefited because we were exposed or unexposed to our element, the writing technologies we as writers use everyday. I cheated since there cannot be found in nature a magnifying glass, which I used.

My ultimate method was to burn the letters, words and sentences into leaves from a tree. Though I did not weep, I did think twice about plucking the greenery from the tree. (Hey, those environmentalists have been hitting us hard since birth with idealistic guilt trips.) There can be a quite powerful little beam of light produced by the focusing of sunlight through glass, but since the magnifying glass cannot be found in nature it was considered cheating even if it is very simple and primitive. I could argue that it could have been an innovation of writing. I really entered my imagination for this project; pretending that this was a desire or goal of mine, to invent this technology or advancement as if it had never been invented before and was necessary.

Since the first words were created, the technology has been advancing. Since I was a young boy, I have been using that technology and this project helps me to realize what struggles and what successes I have encountered. We do not even need pen and paper. I learned to write with paper and pencil. Now, we use computers and voice-mail. These are technologies we did not have a few years ago. I have become so accustomed in such a short time with these brand new technologies. I struggled to find what would be acceptable for the assignment and while I was contemplating, the conclusions teetered between the real significance of the project and the silliness I felt because of not using the conventional, more superior, available technology.