Event series ‘Exzellenz erleben’The Matter of Writing

8 May 2025

Photo: CSMC

Konrad Hirschler (second from left), Philip Döbler (second from right), and Matthias Schemmel (right) during the panel discussion, which was moderated by Peter Helling (left).

At the Hamburg State and University Library (SUB) last week, CSMC researchers and Philip Döbler, Managing Director of the Hamburg-based company Leuchtturm1917, discussed the present and future of handwriting in the digital age. A particular focus was on the subject of ‘thinking by hand’ in notebooks.

If you hold another person’s notebook in your hands, you can literally read their thoughts – assuming you are literate in the respective writing culture. This is the reason why this type of written artefact is so fascinating: It allows the scribe’s mental processes to materialise with all their twists and turns, dead ends, and breakthroughs. In contrast to published writings, which often only communicate the results of intellectual endeavours preceded by numerous trial-and-error moments, notebooks provide the reader with a much more comprehensive picture.

On 30 April, the event ‘Die Materie des Schreibens’ (‘The Matter of Writing’) focused on the special value of notebooks for research and their status in today’s digital age. In the atrium of the SUB, Matthias Schemmel, who is part of the ‘Keeping Note(book)s’ research field (RFG) at the the Cluster of Excellence UWA, Konrad Hirschler, spokesperson of UWA, and Philip Döbler, Managing Director of Leuchtturm1917, a Hamburg-based company known for its high-quality notebooks, discussed this topic together.

A recurring theme of the evening was the interplay between handwriting and technological change. Today’s omnipresence of digital media has not replaced handwriting – nor has the invention of various forms of printing in previous centuries. What these innovations have brought about, however, are changes in the function and meaning of handwriting: The occasions for writing by hand are changing, as is the significance of handwritten objects. Notebooks in particular illustrate this change: Whereas historically they were associated with fleeting, non-careful, purely pragmatic writing, notebook writers today look after these objects with particular devotion and sometimes keep them for a lifetime. Against this backdrop, brands such as Leichtturm1917 attach particular importance to haptic quality of the materials they use – almost the opposite of what was associated with notebooks before the change in meaning brought about by digital media.

The evening was organised by the Universitätsgesellschaft Hamburg (UGH). It marked the start of the ‘Exzellenz erleben’ (‘Experience Excellence’), a series of events which showcase Hamburg’s Clusters of Excellence and bring them into dialogue with regional companies. In addition to the keynote speeches and the panel discussion, the event also offered the opportunity to view particularly noteworthy manuscripts from the holdings of the SUB, which were investigated by CSMC researchers and were part of the exhibition on ‘Hamburgs Schriftschätze’ (‘Written Treasures of Hamburg’) in 2023, and to glance into the work of the CSMC’s Artefact Lab. Researchers from the cluster were available to explain their work in direct conversation.