Spring is the time of year I buy typewriters. It must be the change of season—green shoots pushing up through the thawing earth, bulbs budding and blooming, trees leafing out—which has nothing to do with typewriters, but everything to do with imminence.Article continues after advertisement
I bought the first one in 2023, on April Fool’s Day. The pandemic was only just behind us, we were gearing up for another presidential election, and a few months earlier OpenAI had launched GPT-4. I didn’t know what AI was, but I had a strong premonition that the world was about to change in ways I wasn’t ready for; instead of vernal anticipation, I was filled with dread. I remember saying to a friend, “It’s okay. You all can just go on ahead, but I’ve had enough. I’m going back to the 20th century.”
I was mostly kidding. I like smart phones. I like mRNA vaccines. I didn’t mean to buy the typewriter. I was driving home through Arlington, Massachusetts when I caught sight of a sign above a small storefront that read “Cambridge Typewriter Company.” On a whim, I pulled over. The shop looked closed, but when I tried the door, it opened. A bell tinkled overhead. The interior was dim, but I could see shelves along the walls lined with rows and rows of old typewriters. The owner came out from the back, cleared space on a desk, handed me a stack of paper, and told me to try any machine I liked.
