Dichterhandschriften von Martin Luther bis Sarah Kirsch

by Charlotte Bühler (Editor), Jochen Meyer

German

235 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1999

Reviews

[Kai Weber · Rating 4 out of 5]

Graphology - the study of handwriting and its relation to personality - is nonsense. There may be a little relation between handwriting and personality, but I believe this relation is so very thin that at least we shouldn't draw any simple conclusions, judging a person's personality based on her handwriting.
The introduction to this book is partially falling for the graphologist fallacy. But that doesn't matter much, because the rest of the book is splendid: On every double page we are presented with a facsimile of a famous German language writer's handwriting - excerpts from manuscripts of works, letters, accidental writing. Every facsimile is accompanied with a well-informed text, elaborating the circumstances of the writing. And those notes on the facsimile never ever fall for the graphologist fallacy.
So what is the use of seeing those writer's handwriting, if I don't believe in a simple psychological analogy? It's the aesthetics. It's not graphology, that makes this book interesting, it's calligraphy.