"Friendships grow six times as fast as under the withering blighting influence of the moon of longhand"

January 26, 2011 1:07 PM

"Thou hast here gentle reader, an art of short, and so of speedie wryting, plainly delivered unto thee. So as by thine on industry, thou maiest attain unto it, if thou wilt but one month take paines therein, and by continuance of another month, maiest thou attain to great readiness." So began Characterie, an Arte of Short, Swifte, and secret writing by Character. The original 1588 publication by Timothe Bright, Doctor of Phisike, was the start of modern shorthand. But the Bright system was based on symbols replacing whole words that took years to memorize, as compared to Phineas Bailey's shorthand based on sounds. Phonetic shorthand was improved upon by Sir Isaac Pitman, John Robert Gregg, and others, climbing in popularity that there were even books published in shorthand, including Sherlock Holmes titles, A Christmas Carol, Legend of Sleepy Holllow, and other titles. But the craze died, and the skill has faded, but it is remembered online by language enthusiasts and fans of specific shorthand styles.
posted by filthy light thief (24 comments total)

Note: the title is a quote from Sir Pitman, sourced from Leah Price's history of shorthand (linked above as the craze died), which notes that shorthand was the handicam of it's day, allowing people to copy the theatre performances they attended.
posted by filthy light thief at 1:10 PM on January 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

I read the first link as charcuterie and was expecting a treatise on fast sausage making.

But I've always wanted to learn shorthand, possibly for noting down knitting instructions as I go, but mostly just for the stenographer street cred. Thanks!
posted by peachfuzz at 1:17 PM on January 26, 2011

I taught myself shorthand long ago when I was working as a journo but I've completely forgotten it now. It was incredibly useful and much MUCH faster than working off an audio recording.
posted by unSane at 1:19 PM on January 26, 2011

Hey, it's the same Timothy Bright who wrote "A Treatise of Melancholie", a seminal work of early psychophysiology which many scholars believe Shakespeare used as a crucial reference when creating the character of Hamlet!

The dude got around.
posted by kyrademon at 1:24 PM on January 26, 2011 [2 favorites]

There is quite a decent amount of material on Archive.org, like Ten pen drills in Graham shorthand and Word and sentence drills for Gregg shorthand. Pick your form of shorthand, search, and learn!
posted by filthy light thief at 1:27 PM on January 26, 2011

When I was a legal secretary, there was a certain group of attorneys who liked to dictate to someone taking shorthand, partly I think for the gratifying sensation that someone had to listen to them. I take Gregg, and it helped me get through my dissertation research fieldwork. Still helps me do my evaluation observations at work.
posted by Peach at 1:30 PM on January 26, 2011

there were even books published in shorthand, including Sherlock Holmes titles, A Christmas Carol, Legend of Sleepy Holllow, and other titles. But the craze died, and the skill has faded, but it is remembered online by language enthusiasts

Sounds a bit like Esperanto.
posted by UbuRoivas at 1:32 PM on January 26, 2011

I wonder if there are any Esperanto shorthand boffins out there?
posted by UbuRoivas at 1:33 PM on January 26, 2011

I have an aunt who has spent her career as an executive assistant-type, and she still takes minutes (for board meetings and so on) in Gregg. It blows the minds of people who see it, and she's dead-on accurate with it.
posted by jquinby at 1:38 PM on January 26, 2011

Interesting. When my grandmother would tutor me in reading, she would sometimes write in shorthand when I read aloud then hand me the shorthand to see if I could make the connections. If not, she then sat me down at her desk with her Gregg to try and decipher it.
Whoah, typing from that desk and looking at that Gregg on my shelf.
{checks tin foil over webcam}

A nice jewel. ( The Aurora...)
posted by clavdivs at 1:47 PM on January 26, 2011

As a fan of Samuel Pepys and the Proceedings of the Old Bailey, discussions about the history of shorthand always pique my interest.

I think the point about shorthand being the "handicam of its day" is a really good one, particularly with reference to the early modern period. People sat in church jotting down sermon notes in shorthand, went to executions and recorded the last dying speeches of convicts in shorthand, wrote diaries in shorthand, and used shorthand to record the speeches of politicians. It's amazing how central it was to so many genres of literature and historical events, which is a pity that (along with court reporting) it's dying out.
posted by mattn at 1:50 PM on January 26, 2011

I learned Gregg shorthand in high school and I was very good but I never used it so I lost the skill. A few months ago, I tried to pick it up again but my efforts petered out rather quickly although I was surprised at how much I remembered. I take project meeting minutes and was looking for a way to take better notes. Right now I type them as people speak, which is better than longhand but still less than ideal. Maybe I'll try again but it's difficult to do on your own, like learning another language.
posted by shoesietart at 1:54 PM on January 26, 2011

Shorthand is still popular in countries that have poor access to technological alternatives. In Mexico, for instance, you can still find classes in "taquigrafia".
posted by twoleftfeet at 2:25 PM on January 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

When my dad died, he left just boatloads of manuscripts and what-not. One of the things he left was a dream journal he had kept in shorthand while he was in the Army.
posted by Sidhedevil at 2:30 PM on January 26, 2011

I taught myself shorthand long ago when I was working as a journo but I've completely forgotten it now. It was incredibly useful and much MUCH faster than working off an audio recording.

UnSane,
I had to qualify in shorthand as part of my own long ago graduate journalism training scheme.

By far & away, the most shameful practical use was sitting face-to-face with some self-important ass during an interview, serenely writing childish observations in beautiful Pitman's (god, what a boring nutter & much worse!!) while the interviewee thought you were taking down his or her every word.
posted by Jody Tresidder at 2:33 PM on January 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

UbuRoivas: I wonder if there are any Esperanto shorthand boffins out there?

You're in luck. I thought of including a note on this, but thought it would be too much of a tangent. The "fans of specific shorthand styles" link includes the following:

This site includes in its entirety the remarkably rare adaptation of Gregg Shorthand to the International Language, Esperanto. This adaptation was originally made by Ernest L. Jackson in 1918, and is now fully available here in a legible format. Mr. Jackson assumes that the reader of the adaptation has a good understanding of Pre-Simplified Gregg Shorthand. The instruction is in English.

In short, yes there are/were.
posted by filthy light thief at 3:14 PM on January 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

that there were even books published in shorthand, including Sherlock Holmes titles

Wow, it's been years since I've used shorthand as a journalist and I've just tested myself with the wonderfully clear Pitman's text from the "titles" link. (From Ch. 1 "The Sign of Four".)

I could still read "..took his bottle from the..." - then....total fail!


(Actually, it's a tough bastard of a sentence: "Sherlock Holmes took his bottle from the corner of the mantelpiece, and his hypodermic syringe from its neat morocco case".)
posted by Jody Tresidder at 3:16 PM on January 26, 2011

I wonder if there are any Esperanto shorthand boffins out there?

I honestly read this as I wonder if there are any Esperanto shorthand buttons out there? Because I was thinking of the curious and dying practice of Esperanto pins (or buttons) whereby proficient Esperanto speakers identify themselves to one another.

For a moment I imagined that there were subsets; perhaps Esperanto speakers who were also skilled at Esperanto shorthand would have the appropriate badge. And perhaps other variations. Esperanto rap. Esperanto tongue twisters. Esperanto pickup lines.

I very much like the idea of everybody wearing badges or buttons to signal their own uniqueness, the same way I like the fact that there are birds of many colors and calls.

Somewhere, deep in the forest, the Esperanto bird sings its song in shorthand, and another bird responds...
posted by twoleftfeet at 3:55 PM on January 26, 2011 [1 favorite]

During trials in modernized courtrooms, its easy to forget that everything is being recorded. Getting things "on the record" is a matter of making sure that the microphones are properly placed and everyone is speaking clearly. Even a stenotype machine can fade into the background, and part of the court's attention is attuned to making sure the stenographer is ready.

But my one experience with a stenographer that keeps the record in shorthand? He had a very large pad with cryptic symbols and walked up to hear whomever was speaking. There was no forgetting that someone was writing all of this down. *That* will keep a witness honest and prevent a lawyer from too much grandstanding.
posted by GPF at 4:59 PM on January 26, 2011

I very much like the idea of everybody wearing badges or buttons to signal their own uniqueness, the same way I like the fact that there are birds of many colors and calls.

See also.
posted by sebastienbailard at 7:37 PM on January 26, 2011

In Grant Morrison's "All-Star Superman", there's a chapter that revolves around Clark Kent visiting Lex Luthor in prison to conduct an interview. Morrison's depiction of Luthor combines the megalomania that's been a part of the character forever, along with a nasty streak of petulant paranoia. So, at one point, seized by a particularly powerful surge of bile and outrage that he doesn't know how to channel constructively, he snatches Clark's steno pad away from and demands to know what sort of diabolical secret code he's writing in. Superman's reply is priceless: "It's shorthand, Lex. Take it easy".

Also priceless is Luthor's reaction. "Shorthand? What kind of ridiculous affectation is THAT for a man?" Then he makes some offhand remark indicating that shorthand has gone on his list of things to learn, presumably as a hedge against the possibility that someone will use it against him in the future.
posted by Ipsifendus at 7:03 AM on January 27, 2011 [2 favorites]

Lex Luthor : "Shorthand? What kind of ridiculous affectation is THAT for a man?"

Also in Leah Price's history of shorthand, she mentions that with first the American Civil War, then World War I, shorthand was seen as a less masculine thing to do, especially with so much effort going towards the wars. Men fought or worked, none of this secretive scribbling. Apparently Lex was of the same mind.
posted by filthy light thief at 7:17 AM on January 27, 2011

> In Grant Morrison's "All-Star Superman", there's a chapter that revolves around Clark Kent visiting Lex Luthor in prison to conduct an interview...

Y'know, shockingly, the wikipedia entry somehow doesn't have a "Shorthand in Popular Culture" section...
posted by George_Spiggott at 9:12 AM on January 27, 2011

I thought the "In Popular Culture" section died following that XKCD comic, but this does not appear to be the case (but Wood does not currently have such a section).
posted by filthy light thief at 6:53 PM on January 27, 2011