Either way, as long as we're here I'm going to be as thorough as I can.
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| The Edison pens are handmade by Brian Gray from Ohio, America, specifically Milan, Which also just happens to be the birthplace of Thomas Edison, and whether the one is linked to the other is anyone's guess. |
From the start it should be obvious that I'm not really a fountain pen user.
I'm right handed and as a child I fell into quite a wrong writing pattern: While writing new lines I would slowly drag my hand through the lines I had written above, smudging both paper and hand in the process. I literally got help via a writing coach for this, but alas, 'twas to no avail and I soon fell into bad writing habits once again.
Luckily there were ball-point pens with fine tips that required no effort or specific writing styles to accomodate oneself to. And as soon as I wasn't required to hand in anything to overly demanding school teachers, most of my writing dropped away and what little there was that needed to be recorded would be so, but on hard drives and memory sticks via the medium of keyboard and mouse.
So the times have changed.
But occasionally it's good to go back to those earlier days and revisit those same earlier frustrations.
And what better way to do that with than with a shiny new pen, on loan from no-one other than The Ink-Stained Beard himself.
The pen's body is made out of resin, coloured with faintly reflective shades of burgundy red surrounded with angular black patterning. Cap comes with silver band and clip. The visual effect is quite nice but, personally I don't like the feel of the resin. I would've preferred something cold and patterned in black and blue but I suppose I shouldn't quibble, tastes diverge and that sort of thing.
The Edison #6 steel nib is the silver 1.1 mm stub and here also I would have preferred something different. The thickness of the nib is not to my taste but this can be easily remedied as finer replacement nibs are in large supply. I would indeed need a finer nib as I have a tendency to be inattentive while I write. The physical act of writing is for me merely the means to an end, placing down thoughts on paper and communicating whatever is necessary to whatever party that requires it, be it me or others.
I've never been attracted to the artistry and mechancs to writing itself, or even to calligraphy, mainly because the maximum level of creation to be gotten out of dedication to this skill seemed and still does seem to be out of proportion to what little satisfaction I get from it.
Now in these pictures I wrote down some lines with the pen in question, with Sailor Yama-dori Ink.
I'll elaborate shortly, but I should first specify that the Edison Beaumont accomodates both the standard cartridges (short) but also comes included with a standard international converter, hence here the use of Sailor Yama-dori Ink also helpfully supplied by the charismatic red-bearded character behind the above-mentioned blog.
The ink, when applied to paper, produces a rather startling effect.
At first glance I would have said the ink to be blue but on closer inspection the shade is a light green-blue. It also has an interesting effect where some parts of the writing are left with more residual ink which accumulates to give those particular spots, due to the ink's composition, a reflective reddish hue.
Unfortunately for my tastes and writing style, the dark shades of faintly shimmering dark red give it a messy appearance, with uneven, blotted lettering.
A faintly chemical smell rises from the ink, which Ink-Stained confides in me is due to the use of phenol, which is banned here in Belgium in the creation of ink since it is toxic but which is still used by its japanase creators, 'because they know what works best'. Oddly with me the smell summons up memories of small electricity-powered cars on race tracks. The same acrid smell approaching ozone and rubber.
So, in short. It's a Fountain Pen.
This one does what it needs and looks pretty to boot (but blue would be so much better!)
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