Automatic Writing

When I was looking for information on Automatic Writing it wasn’t long before I started to come across references to Angels, Spirit Guides and Higher Selves. And it wasn’t long after that when I decided that I didn’t want to waste a perfectly fine afternoon on such tosh.

Which left a bit of a problem until I found that there was such a thing as an automatic pen, or autopen (informally known as a signing machine), a mechanical device used for the replicated signing of a signature. Prominent individuals may be asked to provide their signatures many times a day, such as celebrities receiving requests for autographs, or politicians signing documents and correspondence in their official capacities. Consequently, many public figures employ autopens to allow their signature to be printed on demand and without their direct involvement. At the very least I should look into this as you never know.

autopen (1950s model)

The first signature duplicating machines were developed by British American inventor John Isaac Hawkins, who received a United States patent for his device in 1803 in which the user may write with one pen and have their writing simultaneously reproduced by an attached second pen. Thomas Jefferson used the device extensively during his presidency. This device bears little resemblance to today's autopens in design or operation.

The first autopen was developed in the 1930s, and became commercially available in 1937 to record a signer's signature, used as a storage unit device, similar in principle to how vinyl records store information.

The first commercially successful autopen was developed by Robert M. De Shazo Jr., in 1942. De Shazo developed the technology that became the modern autopen in reference to a Request For Quote (RFQ) from the Navy, and in 1942, received an order for the machine from the United States Secretary of the Navy. This was the beginning of a significant market in government for the autopen, as the machines soon ended up in the offices of members of Congress, the Senate and the Executive branches.

Twenty-first-century autopens are machines programmed with a signature subsequently reproduced by a motorized mechanical arm.

a 21st century autopen (and Kafka's signature)

So how does the device work when I may need it for autographs? A stylus driven by an electric motor followed the x- and y-axis of a profile or shape engraved in the plate. The stylus is mechanically connected to an arm which can hold almost any common writing instrument, so that one's pen and ink can be used to suggest authenticity.

Individuals who use autopens often do not disclose this publicly (I wouldn’t either). Signatures generated by machines are valued less than those created manually, and perceived by their recipients as somewhat inauthentic.

It was reported in November 2022 that some copies of The Philosophy of Modern Song, a book by singer-songwriter Bob Dylan that had been published earlier that month, had been signed with an autopen, resulting in criticism. Autographed editions had been marketed as ‘hand-signed’ and priced at US$600 each. Both Dylan and the book's publisher, Simon & Schuster, issued apologies; refunds were also offered to customers who had bought autopen-signed editions.

Margaret Atwood invented The LongPen, a remote type of autopen in 2004 and debuted in 2006. It allows a person to write remotely in ink anywhere connected to the Internet, via a touchscreen device operating a robotic hand. It can also support an audio and video conversation between the endpoints, such as a fan and author, while a book is being signed.

Margaret Atwood

It also means I can use a poem by her now.

Postcards

I'm thinking about you. What else can I say?
The palm trees on the reverse
are a delusion; so is the pink sand.
What we have are the usual
fractured coke bottles and the smell
of backed-up drains, too sweet,
like a mango on the verge
of rot, which we have also.
The air clear sweat, mosquitoes
& their tracks; birds & elusive.

Time comes in waves here, a sickness, one
day after the other rolling on;
I move up, it's called
awake, then down into the uneasy
nights but never
forward. The roosters crow
for hours before dawn, and a prodded
child howls & howls
on the pocked road to school.

In the hold with the baggage
there are two prisoners,
their heads shaved by bayonets, & ten crates
of queasy chicks. Each spring
there's race of cripples, from the store
to the church. This is the sort of junk
I carry with me; and a clipping
about democracy from the local paper.

Outside the window
they're building the damn hotel,
nail by nail, someone's
crumbling dream. A universe that includes you
can't be all bad, but
does it? At this distance
you're a mirage, a glossy image
fixed in the posture
of the last time I saw you.
Turn you over, there's the place
for the address. Wish you were
here. Love comes
in waves like the ocean, a sickness which goes on
& on, a hollow cave
in the head, filling & pounding, a kicked ear.

                                                           Margaret Atwood

Thanks for reading, Terry Q.