Montblanc 342

[penwash]

I always liked this supposedly low-tiered Montblanc offering.

The pen is very nice in the hand, not too fat, not too slim, just right.

And the nibs are just super nice and flexible.



Anybody else has one and care to share about it?

[Jerome Tarshis]

I've only just now come upon this thread, since I don't think of myself as a Montblanc person; I own only three of them, which is nothing by pen message board standards.

One of mine is a 342, and it's a delight. About its flexibility I can't speak, although it feels more vibrant under my hand than many a pen of more recent decades. I don't strive for spreading tines. My pen has some kind of special grind that results in heart-warming line variation. From the shape of the writing part, not from variation in pressure. I find it awfully lovable, indeed so lovable that in the end it doesn't get much use, since I feel that I ought to write with a less felicitous pen, or many of them, and God knows I have less felicitous pens, to earn the relative bliss of writing with my 342.

As for "supposedly low-tiered," I don't know what "supposedly" means. There's a lot we don't know about the ancient Mediterranean, but Montblanc in the 1950s is better documented than Crete under King Minos, and yes, it was a far less expensive pen than others. I also own a Monte Rosa 042, which is not very far from being the same pen, and that was demonstrably less expensive still. A bargain, I'd say. As I would also say of the Parker Super 21.