Nietzsche and The Death of The Typewriter

Hard to believe, but true. Nietzsche used a typewriter (cue PhD thesis?). This bit of information comes from Joan Acocella's interesting review of Darren Wershler-Henry's The Iron Whim: A Fragmented History of Typewriting. Actually, it may not be true that Nietzsche used his typewriter - I emailed Brian Leiter who is an expert on Nietzsche about this, and he replied:

'I'm pretty sure it's inaccurate - I know of no type-written Nietzsche manuscripts'

Does anyone know of evidence to the contrary?

Acocella has a nice bit at the end of the piece about the experience of writing on a computer compared with writing on a typewriter . As I read it I could hear the satisfying clatter of keys, the reassuring end-of-line ping, and the whirr of the cogs as I removed the typed sheet of paper (even the noise of crumpled paper and the parabola of the innacurate lob to the wastebasket all came back). People are making a lot of the death of the book these days (perhaps prematurely). But the typewriter is dead and a whole range of sensual experiences connected with old-style writing will be almost meaningless to the next generation...

Listen to Brian Leiter on Nietzsche.

Comments

[Mark Eli Kalderon]

He owned the Hanson ball:

http://www.typewritermuseum.org/collection/index.php3?machine=hansen&cat=kd

It was a gift of his sister. Histories of the typewriter that I have read suggest that he hated it, but I have only seen this reported, I have never seen the evidence for this claim. There are surviving typewritten documents:

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Image:Nietzsche_Schreibmaschine.JPG

In a letter to Paul Gast, Nietzsche writes: "Our writing tools are also working on our thoughts." If he really didn't like what he called the "schreibkugel", perhaps it was because he did not like what it was doing to his thoughts.

[pat]

hi,

according to Stephan Günzel and Rüdiger Schmidt-Grépály, Nietzsche typed 15 letters, 1 postcard as well as 34 bulk sheets (including some poems and verdicts) with his 'Schreibkugel' from Malling Hansen in 1882.

I am sorry for having only found German resources... all his typewritings are collected here:

http://www.momo-berlin.de/Nietzsche_Schreibmaschinentexte.html

cf.
Stephan Günzel & Rüdiger Schmidt-Grépály (eds.): "Friedrich Nietzsche. Schreibmaschinentexte", 2. edition.
Weimar: Verlag der Bauhaus Universität 2002. ISBN: 3-86068-179-6

[Jim Harrison]

The English translation of Frederich Kittler's book Discourse Networks 1800/1900 includes a photo of a Schreibkugel, though I don't know if it is Nietzsche's typewriter (page 194). Kittler discusses how new technology of writing relates to Nietzsche's philosophy.

[Tony D'Amato]

By contrast, Marcel Proust used nothing but pen and shirt cuffs. This newly discovered fact throws considerable light on the controversy over the "missing" parts of "In Search of Lost Time." Did Proust omit these parts out of a fear that his novel was becoming too long? Or are their omissions a result of editorial zeal on the part of the proprietor of a dry-cleaning establishment in a Parisien arrondissement?