TypeTown #36: "I play with words. I lose, I win. It makes no difference."
🇧🇷 Lygia Fagundes Telles, John Cleese, Julieta Vitullo, and more...
Welcome, welcome, to a distinctly jet-setting edition of TypeTown.
First up is a trip to Brazil, where Wednesday just gone marked what would have been the 105th birthday of novelist Lygia Fagundes Telles.
Born in Sao Paulo in 1918, she only left us in April last year — just days shy of turning 104.
“The shortest distance between two points may be a straight line, but the best things are found on curved paths.”
Her work enjoyed a global reach, translated from her native Portuguese to English, French, Spanish, German, and many more.
Inducted into the Brazilian Academy of Letters in 1985 and nominated for the Noble Prize in Literature in 2016, she is regarded as one of her country’s most important writers of the 20th century.
Over the years, she worked on a Remington Junior, an Olivetti Lettera, and at least two other unidentified machines.
She wrote by hand first, then typed up her next draft.
It was a process that began in 1938, when aged just 15 she published the short story collection Porão e Sobrado.
Three other works — Ciranda de Pedra (1955), Antes do Baile Verde (1970), and As Meninas (1973) — withstood the test of time.
A four-time winner of the Jabuti prize, she also received the prestigious Camões Prize in 2005.
“I play with words. I lose, I win. It makes no difference. What matters is the emotion, the risk, the joy of undertaking this task, which is one of passion.”
READ» Remembering Brazilian Writer Lygia Fagundes Telles - Library of Congress
READ» Lydia Fagundes Telles, Popular Brazilian Novelist, Dies at 98 - The New York Times
TypeTown is free — and always will be. But it’s not cheap, in time or effort. If you have the capacity, please consider buying us a coffee.
A damn good thrashing
Arguably John Cleese’s most famous TV line, here he is doing the same thing to a Royal on the set of 1970s UK sitcom Fawlty Towers.
Cleese, now 83, is an acclaimed actor and comedian. But he reckons his best work is done at the keys of a typewriter (or computer).
One of the co-founders of Monty Python, he co-wrote Fawlty Towers and was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay for A Fish Called Wanda (1988).
His writing advice is straightforward.
“There’s two things you have to do. You have to create boundaries of space, and you have to create boundaries of time. It’s as simple as that.”
With those elements in place, he’s created moments like this:
The craft was always put first.
“The most exciting thing is to write as well as you can.”
He referenced a 1922 Remington typewriter in his memorable eulogy to fellow Monty Python star Graham Chapman. (You can see the first two NSFW minutes here but, alas, not the typewriter reference).
And even his responses to fan letters have left their mark.
READ» John Cleese Tells Us How We Can Be More Creative - Wisconsin Public Radio
READ» Life’s Work: An Interview with John Cleese - Harvard Business Review
Unplugging in style
To another Latin American, now, with a look at Argentinian-born playwright, writer, and typewriter artist Julieta Vitullo.
Based just outside Seattle, her PoemasEternos project uses her Hermes, Olivetti, and Olympia machines to combine art and poetry in powerful fashion.
“Hearing the constant clacking coming from my office across the hallway the day I first started typing, my husband told me that I would soon discover whether I had achieved the status of a genius or a mad person. I think that artists tend to walk on that edge between brilliance and madness.”
Keep walking, Julieta. You’re doing great.
READ» 10 Questions for Julieta Vitullo - The Massachusetts Review
Worth pausing the platen
📬 Northlandia: Typewriter enthusiast keeps machines clicking, clacking - Duluth News Tribune
📬 From my trusted Olivetti to ChatGPT - Kathimerini (English Edition)
📬 ‘He is very, very generous’: Tom Hanks gifts Arlington store a typewriter from his vast collection - Boston Globe
And finally… typewriters in the wild
In this 1923 Walter K. Kinstler depiction of author Irvin Cobb…
In this tweet from Ann Arbor’s Literati Bookstore…
And in this 1940s image from the Auckland Museum collection…
Until next time
❤️ Enjoyed this?
✉️ Forward to a friend and suggest they might subscribe.
☕️ Say thanks with a coffee.
🗣 Anything else? Hit reply and say hello.
Are we all just going to ignore the incorrect use of the possessive in Cleese's response -- "Michael Palins' fan club"???
Another one of my idols tarnished. I don't know how I'll sleep tonight.
Love this piece. Specially being a Brazilian and having Lygia here ❤️🙌🏻