The importance of proper handwriting

Walter Pall

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The importance of proper handwriting

by Walter Pall http://walter-pall.de/



In Germany we have this Institute of Adult Education in every town. Regardless of age or former education one can study such things as languages, music, painting, pottery, astronomy, philosophy – endless offers of education for very little money but with qualified teachers.



I took a class called „Poetry“. The instructor was a man who came from Italy where he was a poetry legend. In the beginning the man spoke five minutes about the history and importance of poetry and the immense importance of proper technique. Then he handed out a blank piece of paper and a pencil to everyone. „Write a poem of twelve lines“ he said. There were a couple dozen folks in the room, female and male, old and young beginners advanced – all sorts. After 30 minutes the poems were collected. The master took the first one and said „I cannot read this terrible handwriting, do it again.“ Then about the next one he said „very bad handwriting you have, again“. After glancing over the rest he decided to teach proper writing for the rest of the lesson.



In the following week I cam back only to find that abut a third of the original students were present. Same thing - „Write a poem of twelve lines“. We all tried very hard to concentrate on handwriting. I had practiced my writing over the weekend and thought that it was pretty good. Anyway, the master found many faults again on my handwriting and, of course, also on the rest of the class. Only once he was kind of happy and briefly spoke about content – he changed some word, but we could not understand why.



In the third week I came back and found myself to be the only student of poetry left. Same procedure. I wrote my twelve lines and concentrated a lot on my writing. He looked at it for a while, changed a few words, shuffled a bit and indeed the poem seemed to be better to me, at least different. He said „Now you have started to master the most important thing necessary to write good poems“. Then he went on to criticize my spelling and syntax skills. He made it clear to me that he planned to concentrate on this for the rest of the term.



I never went back and the master, I heard, left town disappointed and vowed never to come back to these ignorants who had no talent for poetry and no will to achieve.



I gave up poetry after this.



What has this to do with bonsai?
 
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The importance of proper handwriting

by Walter Pall http://walter-pall.de/



In Germany we have this Institute of Adult Education in every town. Regardless of age or former education one can study such things as languages, music, painting, pottery, astronomy, philosophy – endless offers of education for very little money but with qualified teachers.



I took a class called „Poetry“. The instructor was a man who came from Italy where he was a poetry legend. In the beginning the man spoke five minutes about the history and importance of poetry and the immense importance of proper technique. Then he handed out a blank piece of paper and a pencil to everyone. „Write a poem of twelve lines“ he said. There were a couple dozen folks in the room, female and male, old and young beginners advanced – all sorts. After 30 minutes the poems were collected. The master took the first one and said „I cannot read this terrible handwriting, do it again.“ Then about the next one he said „very bad handwriting you have, again“. After glancing over the rest he decided to teach proper writing for the rest of the lesson.



In the following week I cam back only to find that abut a third of the original students were present. Same thing - „Write a poem of twelve lines“. We all tried very hard to concentrate on handwriting. I had practiced my writing over the weekend and thought that it was pretty good. Anyway, the master found many faults again on my handwriting and, of course, also on the rest of the class. Only once he was kind of happy and briefly spoke about content – he changed some word, but we could not understand why.



In the third week I came back and found myself to be the only student of poetry left. Same procedure. I wrote my twelve lines and concentrated a lot on my writing. He looked at it for a while, changed a few words, shuffled a bit and indeed the poem seemed to be better to me, at least different. He said „Now you have started to master the most important thing necessary to write good poems“. Then he went on to criticize my spelling and syntax skills. He made it clear to me that he planned to concentrate on this for the rest of the term.



I never went back and the master, I heard, left town disappointed and vowed never to come back to these ignorants who had no talent for poetry and no will to achieve.



I gave up poetry after this.



What has this to do with bonsai?
My tai chi teacher explained to me that mastery of the whole involved mastery of the small thing first.

What has this to do with bonsai?
 

sparklemotion

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I saw it differently. The teacher was bad for two reasons.

First, that he believed that penmanship was fundamental, even though great poetry can be typed.

Second, that he could not show his students why the supposed "fundamentals" were so vital.

I often see critiques of bonsai that call out "sloppy wiring." Unless a student knows why neat wiring is important, why would that critique matter to them?
 

AZbonsai

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It tells me you had a class of uncoachable students. To be coached (taught) anything, you have to have these 5 traits:
Humility
Commitment
Self-Awareness
Willingness to Learn
Faith
I just read an article about this I will get a link if I can find it.
This is not the original article but on the same line.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/august...you-coachable-the-five-steps-to-coachability/
 
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Anthony

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Humility and willingness to learn.
Faith ----- belief that the teacher can guide.

Poetry, brave man to try, concentrated emotion.
Not easy.

Also I add imagination and having built or fed that imagination, with
enough reading, experiencing and an open mind.
Good Day
Anthony
 

Gene Deci

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Bonsai, like poetry, is an art form. Some say it is not possible to teach artistic creativity so they focus on skills and techniques that which can be taught. That of course accomplishes nothing but disappointment for all involved.
 

Bonsai Nut

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Poetry is an art form. It is the sum of its parts. It isn't about handwriting or syntax. It is about heart and feeling. A poem rises above paper and pen. Same can be said about music. At its most basic, music is a bunch of notes on a piece of paper. But music performed by a master is sublime.

Bonsai need to be experienced and "felt" figuratively. If all you do is look at photos of bonsai, you may start to think bonsai is all about specific lines and forms - about rules that need to be followed. You need to understand the rules and forms - just like you need to understand language to write poetry. But they are simply tools to accomplish art... and not art in themselves.
 

AZbonsai

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Faith ----- belief that the teacher can guide.

I think this is the larger point. You have to have faith that the person you are learning under has the ability to get you where you need to go. People in Walter's class lost faith in the person who was teaching the class and they gave up. Who knows, if they would have stuck with it maybe down the road would have been instruction about how to connect with the world around you and turn those feelings into poetry. I have been fortunate to have taken a couple of David Nguyen classes and he started out the same way in both. He cut a branch off a tree and taught people the correct method for wiring and then made people rewire if they made a mistake. It is the most basic step of bonsai I believe. I will take his classes in the future and sit through his tree cutting and wiring demo at the beginning because I have faith that he will eventually lead me to where I want to go.
 
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I think this is the larger point. You have to have faith that the person you are learning under has the ability to get you where you need to go. People in Walter's class lost faith in the person who was teaching the class and they gave up. Who knows, if they would have stuck with it maybe down the road would have been instruction about how to connect with the world around you and turn those feelings into poetry. I have been fortunate to have taken a couple of David Nguyen classes and he started out the same way in both. He cut a branch off a tree and taught people the correct method for wiring and then made people rewire if they made a mistake. It is the most basic step of bonsai I believe. I will take his classes in the future and sit through his tree cutting and wiring demo at the beginning because I have faith that he will eventually lead me to where I want to go.
I think they just didn't want to work very hard.
 

James W.

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I think handwriting in poetry might be analogous to pots in bonsai. Any adequate pot can grow bonsai, just as any legible writing is good enough to write poetry. A well selected pot is certainly critical in the display of bonsai, just like nice calligraphy would be important if you were going to try to sell me a framed copy of your poem.
I'm pretty sure I would loose faith in a instructor who spent the first 3 classes criticizing the pots my stick-inna-bucket was planted in. Unless I understood ahead of time that he would be teaching on how to select a pot.
 

ColinFraser

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What has this to do with bonsai?
This reminds me of a recent conversation I had regarding athletics, and it can probably be generalized to poetry and Bonsai as well:

People who are naturally very good at something, whether it’s hitting a baseball or writing music, are often not the best teachers of that thing. They sometimes don’t even know how they actually do what they do - they just do it.

Those who have struggled to improve their skills often spend more time thinking about how to get where they want to be, so they may be better able to explain it to others as well. These people are often not the very best or the RockStars in their fields, but they may make better coaches and teachers than the Savants do . . .
 
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There is a big difference between being good at something and being good at teaching that thing. Shame on that teacher, they got paid to do a job and insteadand took a room full of interested engaged students and turned it into an empty room and a bunch of discouraged ex students. Get better teachers.
 

AZbonsai

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I am a teacher. Not how I would have handled the class and I have no problem with the students deciding to walk out. Nothing wrong with them determining this is not the guy who is going to get them to where they want to be. The five things that were listed in the article need to be present in order for someone to learn....bonsai....piano.....checkers whatever. And artistic ability, like others have pointed out, is very hard, if not impossible, to develop. Another point of the 5 was Self-Awareness. David, see my post above, is a master at bonsai. I could take his classes and he could teach me everything he knows, however, I have enough self-awareness to know I will never be a master. Not in a million years. I might become technically proficient and create some wonderful bonsai. But I will never be a master. And I am ok with that!
 

sorce

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Means.

Wax On.

Don't assume.

Can't spell assume without Ass.

Sorce
 
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