This post is doing the rounds again.
Everything in it remains true: Moleskine notebooks are overpriced for what they are, and even over-hyped; they’re not the original Moleskines referred to in the Bruce Chatwin (famous travel writer) anecdote which accompanies (or used to) each one. This is a typical example; here’s an extract:
Moleskine notebooks are synonymous with understated style and professionalism. They have been used by some of the greatest writers of our time, including Ernest Hemmingway and Oscar Wilde, whilst plain paper versions were popular with artists Picasso and Van Gogh.
Current Moleskines are a 1997 product which resurrected a long-defunct brand. If those Great Names used them there must have been a bit more resurrection going on, because by 1997 every single one - including Moleskine’s poster-boy Chatwin - was also defunct, most of them for quite a long time…
There are many other elastic-closure notebooks far more fit for purpose, especially if that purpose involves a fountain pen. My own current fave is Rhodia, with a Leuchtturm next in the queue, though I bought a few Moleskines some years ago when I still used gel pens a lot (Pilot G-2s are excellent).
Despite changing almost entirely to fountain pens, I’ve been working my way through the Moleskines because TBH they were too expensive just to chuck out. But they’re restricted almost entirely to gels again, because the wretched paper is so prone to bleed-through.
Here’s the other side. Every line is visible to some extent, and a couple of them have bled through. A broader nib, wetter ink or indeed both combined would leave marks so severe that a “120 page” notebook might have just 60 useable pages, and if the bleed-through was bad enough to mark the next page as well, maybe not even that.
There are several reasons for bleed-through: nib width (obviously a Broad nib <B> lays down more ink than an Extra-Fine <EF>), ink viscosity (“wet” flows faster than “dry”) and the way nibs vary between manufacturers, because widths don’t seem to have a standardised size.
It’s obvious that my Lamy Al-Star <EF> nib writes far broader than my Pilot MR <F>. With the same ink in both, the difference wouldn’t be as conspicuous, though I suspect it would still be there; Lamy nibs skew wide while Japanese nibs skew fine. Those variables apply to all the rest as well.
So why use broad nibs and wet ink if it’s so messy?
On heavy or just well-finished paper it isn’t, and the combination is (a) pleasant to write with, since the nib skims effortlessly along a lubricant of ink and (b) broader nibs with a bit of flexibility create more obvious line variation, and that makes for graceful handwriting…
…and fountain-pens in general, due to not needing pressure, can and probably will improve the sort of scrawl ingrained by years of using ballpoints. Voice of Experience.
The primary reason for bleed-through is low-grade paper, and Moleskine has that without a doubt. They should spend less on marketing and fancy associate-with-whatever’s-trendy-now covers and more on better materials, but they don’t need to, having settled into the comfortable “Lifestyle Accessory” slot where things sell by familiarity of brand-name, not quality of product.
IMO Mont Blanc fountain pens are there too, and have been since the early 1990s. @dduane‘s MB-146 was one of the last without the various authenticity marks that happen once a thing becomes desirable enough to be worth counterfeiting - as in China, which churns out a lot of fake MBs. (China is also where Moleskines are made…)
DD’s 146 may also be one of the last meant for use rather than possession. Nowadays (IMO again) a big MB is the fountain pen To Be Seen With. The equivalent big fountain pen To Write With is a Pelikan.
Just don’t try using either of them in a Moleskine…
And yet, rummaging through old posts, I found something which amazed me as much now as when I first saw it 8 years ago. This was done with ballpoint pen on Moleskine, and embellished with real gold.
