Council dimension–the physical world in which the alchemists of The Alchemists’ Council primarily reside–is exquisitely beautiful, encompassing not only grounds “vast and lush and tinged with blue mist at dawn” but also classrooms “shelved from floor to ceiling with alchemical vessels and powders and liquors and crystals ground finer than the most precious of salts, with parchments and pens and inks so potent that they can change the world in a single point bled from pen to parchment” (xiii-xiv).

My choice for the alchemists to write to manipulate their world(s) is twofold. It derives, first, from my academic work on alchemist-poets such as Thomas Norton and George Ripley (a subject for a future post, perhaps) and, second, from my love of the physicality of writing: of the pen and the ink and the paper.

My friends Marni and Kathryn gave me the Campo Marzio pen with which I began writing The Alchemists’ Council:

These were the first words I composed with that pen, some of which you may recognize from the published version:

More recently, an important Council document was also composed with that pen–a letter from Cedar to Genevre (an outside world scribe who will be introduced in Book Two):

Though I am grateful for the book’s inaugural pen and ink, my fascination with such materials did not begin with The Alchemists’ Council. Years earlier, while teaching at Nipissing University in the summer of 1999, a friend and I would sit for hours talking about various aspects of writing, including the sensuous and sensual flow of ink from pen to paper. We bought identical Sigma fountain pens that summer and encouraged each other to write. I was to write a novel; she was to write a screenplay. Thus began The Elijah Tree.

In the summer of 2015, as I began writing Book Two of The Alchemists’ Council, I sought out my Nipissing pen once again to see if it still worked. Indeed, it did:

And my calligraphic passion continues. Just yesterday, I received this exquisite gift of a Pilot Metropolitan pen, with which I now plan to write parts of Book Two:

Today while searching through a file box for the 1999 pen-in-hand photo featured at the top of this post, I had to laugh when I came across an award plaque, dated thirty-four years ago to the day:

Being a high school typing champion has its advantages. After all, every passage I write by hand must eventually be typed into the manuscript. Indeed, I often compose directly at the computer. But I will always find something beautiful and meditative about handwriting. And I am certainly thankful I attended grade school when lessons in cursive penmanship were still required curriculum.

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