Writing Angle

[gbryal]

I have a pretty boring tripod grip when I write. It works out OK, though sometimes threads rub the last joint of my middle finger.

So, I thought I was doing pretty well, but lately I have been wondering about my writing angle. Not the vertical angle to the paper, but a combination of yaw and roll to the left.

The roll gets corrected more or less by itself: if I roll too much the pen doesn't write.

The yaw doesn't cause any problems, but when I write with a stub, it means my left to right bottom to top diagonals are the thinnest, my left to right top to bottom diagonals are thickest (and don't come up much in cursive for me), and everything else is meh.

It occurred to me that maybe the correct way is to orient a stub or italic such that the width of the nib is parallel to the writing line, e.g. the ruled lines in a notebook, and that the motion of my hand should be mostly a plus shape (as opposed to an X).

This does yield a more interesting line (and makes the distinction between an italic or stub and an architect grind make more sense). But it's awkward, as my arms are attached to my shoulders and don't grow from the middle of my chest. This way also seems to make more sense with flex writing, where downward motion seems like it should be oriented in a straight line toward or away from the writer.

Anyway, just wondering, do I write funny? Do most people orient their pen like I do or is their approach more where the nib slit is perpendicular to the page's bottom?

Also, this is complicated by paper angle. I've been told by different teachers to slant the paper and to not slant the paper. I try to do both ways evenly in case there's some cosmic consequence.