Reference Books

Online resources are great, but there's still no substitute for a good book.  We are now participants in Amazon's associates program, so most of the titles mentioned below can now be ordered directly from this page by simply following the links.

An essential reference work for American pens is George Fischler and Stuart Schneider's massive Fountain Pens and Pencils: The Golden Age of Writing Instruments – not cheap, but an investment that will quickly pay for itself.  Solidly researched with extensive color illustrations and a quite good price guide.  Sometimes called the "Blue Book" (from its dust jacket color), this volume should be on every pen collector's reference shelf.  If you have to have only one pen book, this is probably the one. 9" x 12", 320 pages, 970 color photos, hardcover.  Second revised edition, 1998.

Fischler and Schneider's second opus, The Book of Fountain Pens and Pencils (also known as the "Brown Book") is another massive volume packed with information and color illustrations.  It is basically a supplement to the first volume – useful, but not essential. Our advice: get the Blue Book first.  Includes price guide and sections on advertising, decoration, and repair. 9" x 12", 276 pages, illustrations of over 700 pens & pencils, hardcover.

A truly important work and a must for pencil collectors is Deb Crosby's pioneering Victorian Pencils: Tools to Jewels (Schiffer, 1998).  This is a heavily-illustrated hardback which covers a great deal of new material, incorporating much original research.   It has already had a significant impact on the collecting of pencils and dip pens. Includes pricing information.  8 1/2" x 11", 706 color photos, 224 pages, hardcover.

Paul Erano's first pen book was a bare-bones paperback with an innovative approach to helping readers understand what features make certain pens more or less appealing to collectors.  The same practical attitude informs his Fountain Pens: Past & Present, which many collectors now swear by. 224 pages, heavily illustrated in color, hardbound, with price guide.

Fischler and Schneider's The Illustrated Guide to Antique Writing Instruments is an affordable pocket-sized paperback that is particularly handy as a take-along price guide.  Coverage of pens and pen history is, however, rather less than comprehensive, so don't shortchange your enjoyment of pen collecting by making this your only reference book. Revised 3rd edition, 6" x 9", 556 color photos, 160 pages, softbound.

Another economical volume is Jonathan Steinberg's Fountain Pens: A Collector's Guide. Full of beautiful illustrations, this book by and large showcases the rarest and most exotic. No price guide, but the book is worth it for the pictures alone. This book was hard to locate for a while due to disputes between author and publisher over reprintings, but should now be available once again.

Andy Lambrou's 1995 Fountain Pens of the World is lavishly illustrated, and covers penmakers across the world nearly up to the present day.  Full of information, but a bit weak on the smaller US brands.  No price guide.

An absolute must for anyone with a serious interest in pen and pencil history!  Michael Kidd has put together an astonishingly comprehensive reference to US writing equipment patents, consisting of a CD-ROM accompanied by a spiral-bound index.  A vast amount of information for an extremely reasonable price.

Jim Marshall's Pens & Writing Equipment: A Collector's Guide is a 100 page pocket-sized paperback, part of Miller's Collector's Guides series. Written from an English perspective, it covers a great range of material including dip pens, quill cutters, and the like.  Concise and informative with good illustrations, all for under $10!  Excellent value.

A handy book originally published in the UK is Alexander Crum Ewing's The Fountain Pen: A Collector's Companion. This handsomely illustrated guide's primary focus is on modern pens, but there is considerable information on vintage as well, including illustrations and discussion of early specimens not readily found elsewhere.

Recently off the press, Namiki: The Art of Japanese Lacquer Pens by Julia Hutt and Stephen Overbury has been published in a limited edition of 2000 copies, priced at $175.  Distribution is exclusively through The Battersea Pen Home.

Ballpoint pen collectors have pretty much been left out in the cold, but there's now a book co-written by Henry Gostony and Stuart Schneider and published by Schiffer: The Incredible Ball Point.  A comprehensive history with plenty of colorful details about the mad rush to riches occasioned by the ballpoint's initial introduction, the crash that followed, and the subsequent developments that led to the ballpoint's present market dominance.  Heavily illustrated, with price guide.  8 1/2" x 11", 469 color photos, 160 pages, softcover.

OUT OF STOCK: A fascinating book on the history and uses of the material that made fountain pen production practical, Mike Woshner's India-Rubber and Gutta-Percha in the Civil War Era (1999) is a gold mine of information found nowhere else.  Focus is on military and utilitarian objects, c. 1840-60, with listings of patents and extensive bibliography.   A 320 page small-press hardback with very limited distribution, available from us at $45 postpaid in the USA, shipped at cost abroad.

A fascinating book for anyone interested in the history of writing is engineer Henry Petroski's The Pencil: A History of Design and Circumstance.   The focus here is not on elaborately decorated instruments so much as ordinary workaday pencils -- their manufacture, technology, and social history.  Recommended reading and a great gift for anyone who writes. Available in hardcover or paperback

Bonhams pen auction catalogs: Useful references, we have a small quantity from various sales available at $20 each. Most are no longer available from Bonhams; most have prices realized, but in any event this information can always be obtained directly from the auction house.

OUT OF PRINT SPECIAL: This 12 page magazine-size publication was the illustrated checklist for a 1994 exhibition of Italian vintage pens in Milan.  Text in Italian, half of the pages with color pictures; a useful reference for the price. $6 postpaid in the USA, shipped at cost abroad.

Interested in real old-time calligraphy, including the use of quill and reed pens and the application of gold leaf to vellum?  Edward Johnston's classic Writing & Illuminating & Lettering has been in print for decades for good reason, and is currently available as a thick but reasonably-priced Dover paperback.

Available in hardcover or paperbound

Having trouble finding out about the technical aspects of the illustration of manuscripts?  Jonathan J. G. Alexander's  Medieval Illuminators and Their Methods of Work (Yale, 1994) is the definitive scholarly study, now available in a high-quality university press paperback edition.  Recommended to anyone with an interest in medieval manuscripts.