Why "Streptography"?

This blog contains two types of entries: examinations of shorthand systems and personal musings. The audience for either of these, I imagine, is small, and smaller still the overlap. But there is something of myself I see in the minds of shorthand inventors, and indeed in the systems themselves, so that I can't help but combine the two.

The name "Streptography" is not actually a word--I made it up. And while it might sound hilariously pretentious, it comes from a tradition among shorthand systems to bear names like Tachygraphy (swift writing), Brachygraphy (short writing), Semography (sign writing), Alethography (true writing), and Pantagraphy (all-writing), which admittedly are also hilariously pretentious. Based on the Greek roots, streptography would mean "twisted writing," "bent writing," or "writing consisting of things strung together," each of which I think is apt in describing shorthand systems. Or describing my personal writing, too.

In a perverse way, I enjoy how the root strept- in English pretty much always relates to illness. I'm sure the creators of shorthand systems were physically healthy, but their obsession to prove that their own system was the perfect system lies somewhere on the outskirts of sanity. You could wallpaper a large house using the books that one by one claimed to be the ultimate method of saving time and paper.

I feel driven to write about shorthand systems not because I think any is perfect, but not because I think they're failures either. I study them because I sympathize with them. The inventors really loved their systems--I believe it. But unlike a scientific discovery or a feat of engineering, which might fade out of use but lead to greater discoveries in the field, shorthand systems lead to a dead end. Even the pinnacle of the art would today be considered obsolete by most.

Utility, though, is only one perspective. What does shorthand say about human nature? To design a shorthand system is to be an idealist. It is to use one's handmade rules to grapple with the inconsistencies of language and to triumph (or believe that triumph is possible). I maintain that in the presence of flaws and in the absence of practicality--there might yet be beauty.