STAN FREBERG HERE...The Typewriter Report (Part Two)
Stan Freberg here with more thoughts on the gradual disappearance of the typewriter. Kinda sad to a man who's never been very far from a typewriter since he started to write as a teenager. As I write this on a computer, I'm glancing across the room at a couple of backup typewriters. You know, in case this electronic wonder crashes. Back in a minute. [:60 SPOT BREAK]
Fortunately, although I write most of the time on a Macintosh, I still have several typewriters on the premises. That's nothing compared to TV writer extraordinaire Stephen J. Cannell, creator of shows like "The Rockford Files," "Hunter," and "(The) Renegade," and who writes only on a typewriter. He just bought a hundred and fifty IBM Selectric typewriters from a studio that converted to computers. That way, I guess he can write a different show on every typewriter.
My friend, science-fiction master Ray Bradbury, one of the most prolific writers I know, wouldn't own a computer! He, too, would miss the feel of ripping another completed page out of the carriage.
Even with Smith-Corona bowing out, typewriters are still made by companies like Lexmark; and when my Olivetti needs a tuneup, Jose, at the "Best Typewriter Shop" in Beverly Hills, is one of the last places that fixes typewriters.
One of the things wrong with writing on a computer, is that there is no satisfying "clackety-clack" of the keys. I hear there's a software disk you can buy that supplies that sound, for computer writers who miss the sound of a typewriter, but that's not the same thing at all, is it?
Stan Freberg here.
Copyright (C)1996, Stan Freberg/Freberg, Ltd. (but not very) Distributed by Dick Brescia Associates and Radio Spirits, Inc.