movement. The circles and hooks can also be executed with greater speed if the finger movement is combined with arm and wrist movement.
Keep the wrist and ball of the hand from touching the paper or the desk, but the whole forearm from the elbow to the wrist should rest on the table. With the second, third and fourth fingers turned in, as shown in the illustrations, the hand will be in a position to glide easily on the nails of these fingers.
Hold the pen with just enough pressure to give you command of it, but do not grip it so firmly and ten aciously that all flexibility of move.. ment is destroyed. Gripping the pen with a death-like hold is one of the most common habits young and inexperienced writers acquire, and it is fatal to high speed and to ease of execution.
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Illustration of Correct Position of Hand and Arm
In all arts "form" or "technique" is of vast importance. Study the work of the violinist, the pianist, the golfer, the tennis player, and it will be seen that the experts have acquired a certain grace of form, an art in execution that at once appeals to us because of its obvious effectiveness.
The late David Wolfe Brown, the famous congressional reporter, says: "Pen gripping, involving as it does needless muscular effort, tends to promote an inartistic style of writing, interferes with the acquisition of speed, and induces undue and premature fatigue, to say nothing of the ultimate danger of pen paralysis from the unnecessary, excessive and long-continued muscular strain."
Light Touch.—Alight touch of pen or pencil upon the paper
