essay on notebook day

Joan Didion on Keeping a Notebook

By maria popova.

After citing a seemingly arbitrary vignette she had found scribbled in an old notebook, Didion asks:

Why did I write it down? In order to remember, of course, but exactly what was it I wanted to remember? How much of it actually happened? Did any of it? Why do I keep a notebook at all? It is easy to deceive oneself on all those scores. The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself. I suppose that it begins or does not begin in the cradle. Although I have felt compelled to write things down since I was five years old, I doubt that my daughter ever will, for she is a singularly blessed and accepting child, delighted with life exactly as life presents itself to her, unafraid to go to sleep and unafraid to wake up. Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss. […] The point of my keeping a notebook has never been, nor is it now, to have an accurate factual record of what I have been doing or thinking. That would be a different impulse entirely, an instinct for reality which I sometimes envy but do not possess.

To that end, she confesses a lifelong failure at keeping a diary:

I always had trouble distinguishing between what happened and what merely might have happened, but I remain unconvinced that the distinction, for my purposes, matters.

What, then, does matter?

How it felt to me: that is getting closer to the truth about a notebook. I sometimes delude myself about why I keep a notebook, imagine that some thrifty virtue derives from preserving everything observed. See enough and write it down, I tell myself, and then some morning when the world seems drained of wonder, some day when I am only going through the motions of doing what I am supposed to do, which is write — on that bankrupt morning I will simply open my notebook and there it will all be, a forgotten account with accumulated interest, paid passage back to the world out there: dialogue overheard in hotels and elevators and at the hat-check counter in Pavillon (one middle-aged man shows his hat check to another and says, ‘That’s my old football number’); impressions of Bettina Aptheker and Benjamin Sonnenberg and Teddy (‘Mr. Acapulco’) Stauffer; careful aperçus about tennis bums and failed fashion models and Greek shipping heiresses, one of whom taught me a significant lesson (a lesson I could have learned from F. Scott Fitzgerald, but perhaps we all must meet the very rich for ourselves) by asking, when I arrived to interview her in her orchid-filled sitting room on the second day of a paralyzing New York blizzard, whether it was snowing outside. I imagine, in other words, that the notebook is about other people. But of course it is not. I have no real business with what one stranger said to another at the hat-check counter in Pavillon; in fact I suspect that the line ‘That’s my old football number’ touched not my own imagination at all, but merely some memory of something once read, probably ‘The Eighty-Yard Run.’ Nor is my concern with a woman in a dirty crepe-de-Chine wrapper in a Wilmington bar. My stake is always, of course, in the unmentioned girl in the plaid silk dress. Remember what it was to be me: that is always the point. It is a difficult point to admit. We are brought up in the ethic that others, any others, all others, are by definition more interesting than ourselves; taught to be diffident, just this side of self-effacing. (‘You’re the least important person in the room and don’t forget it,’ Jessica Mitford’s governess would hiss in her ear on the advent of any social occasion; I copied that into my notebook because it is only recently that I have been able to enter a room without hearing some such phrase in my inner ear.) Only the very young and the very old may recount their dreams at breakfast, dwell upon self, interrupt with memories of beach picnics and favorite Liberty lawn dresses and the rainbow trout in a creek near Colorado Springs. The rest of us are expected, rightly, to affect absorption in other people’s favorite dresses, other people’s trout.

Once again, Didion returns to the egoic driver of the motive to write :

And so we do. But our notebooks give us away, for however dutifully we record what we see around us, the common denominator of all we see is always, transparently, shamelessly, the implacable “I.” We are not talking here about the kind of notebook that is patently for public consumption, a structural conceit for binding together a series of graceful pensées ; we are talking about something private, about bits of the mind’s string too short to use, an indiscriminate and erratic assemblage with meaning only for its maker.

Ultimately, Didion sees the deepest value of the notebook as a reconciliation tool for the self and all of its iterations:

I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind’s door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were. […] It is a good idea, then, to keep in touch, and I suppose that keeping in touch is what notebooks are all about. And we are all on our own when it comes to keeping those lines open to ourselves: your notebook will never help me, nor mine you.

The rest of Slouching Towards Bethlehem is brimming with the same kind of uncompromising insight, sharp and soft at the same time, on everything from morality to marriage to self-respect . Complement this particular portion with celebrated writers on the creative benefits of keeping a diary .

— Published November 19, 2012 — https://www.themarginalian.org/2012/11/19/joan-didion-on-keeping-a-notebook/ —

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On Keeping a (Writing) Notebook (or Three)

Randon Billings Noble

In her essay “ On Keeping a Notebook, ” Joan Didion writes about the odd notes she has taken over the years – on conversations she has overheard (“That woman Estelle is partly the reason why George Sharp and I are separated today”), facts she has learned (“during 1964, 720 tons of soot fell on every square mile of New York City”), and observations she has made (“Redhead getting out of car in front of Beverly Wilshire Hotel, chinchilla stole, Vuitton bags with tags reading: MRS LOU FOX / HOTEL SAHARA / VEGAS).  She writes that each note “presumably has some meaning to me …” but admits that she can’t always recall what it is. For her the point is to “[r]emember what it was to be me.”

That’s what I use a journal for – not a notebook. Perhaps these classifications are splitting hairs, but Didion sees a difference, too. She claims that at

no point have I ever been able successfully to keep a diary; my approach to daily life ranges from the grossly negligent to the merely absent, and on those few occasions when I have tried dutifully to record a day’s events, boredom has so overcome me that the results are mysterious at best. What is this business about “shopping, typing piece, dinner with E, depressed”? Shopping for what? Typing what piece? Who is E? Was this “E” depressed, or was I depressed?

I would split the hair again and claim that there’s a difference between a diary and a journal – that it’s sort of like the difference between an autobiography and a memoir: in a diary you record each day’s events and in a journal you write whatever you want about your day whenever you want to write about it. For Didion, though, it’s all about the notebook.

I, too, keep a notebook – a writing notebook – and when I mentioned this during a presentation I gave on research in creative nonfiction, a hand in the audience immediately shot up: What did I write in my writing notebook? Some writers are dismissive of these kinds of questions – do you write in a notebook or on a computer, what kind of pen do you use, what kind of paper? But I’m happy to talk about the physical practicalities of craft – I want to know about your Pilot G-2 and your Clairefontaines. And I’m happy to talk about the content, too. When I answered the question many people took notes – perhaps in their writing notebooks. Here’s a version of what I said:

I keep three versions of a writing notebook: a journal, a writing notebook, and a writing planner.

In my journal I write down what happens to me, what I’m thinking about, occasional random observations, lists – the usual stuff you’d write in a journal. But I include this under “writing notebooks” because (especially as a writer of creative nonfiction) I often look back on journals to remember a certain time or place or person or line of thought – although I never write in my journal with this in mind. I write here solely as a person – not a writer.

Here is a journal entry I made on May 11, 2015, after walking through an Elaine de Kooning exhibit at the National Portrait Gallery:

In my “official” writing notebook I jot down ideas for writing projects, make lists for writing projects, and write sketches of writing projects. Often I’ll start writing towards a draft but without any sense of where I’m headed. Writing by hand takes the pressure off: I can’t send ripped-out notebook pages to The New Yorker . But when a piece moves from my notebook to my computer and eventually (sometimes) to publication, I can see that long passages are often exactly the same as when I wrote them by hand the first time.

This is what I wrote in my writing notebook soon after the journal entry above:

Then there’s my writing planner, the newest addition to my series of writing notebooks. It’s a Moleskine “weekly notebook” that has a calendar page laying out the days of the week on the left side and plain lined pages on the right side. I use this for short- and long-term planning. When I hear of a submission, contest, or application deadline I write it down on the calendar side; then I flip back a few weeks (or months) and write a reminder on the notebook side. On Sundays, a day I usually have a long swath of time to myself, I flip to the next week and write some plans. Then, during the week, when I have an hour or two to myself, I open my writing planner and do what it tells me (this is especially useful when the demands of everyday life are so crushing I can’t think straight). If I find that I can’t manage much I flip ahead a week or two and write “don’t forget about [idea]” and try again then. Every so often I flip back to look for unchecked boxes. It’s a lovely tool for preservation – and for looking and planning ahead to, say, a retreat or residency.

Here is a not-so-productive week in my writing planner (with only a deadline reminder for my piece about The Folded Clock ):

And here is a very productive week at the glorious Virginia Center for the Creative Arts :

What would Joan Didion think of all these notebooks? I smile/shudder to think. But my writing notebooks keep me writing – through rejection, triumph, inspiration, and disenchantment; in the face of preschooler twins, tantrums, field trips, and snow days; on the crests and in the troughs; at home and away – all the months of the year.

Randon Billings Noble is an essayist. Her work has appeared in the Modern Love column of The New York Times, The Georgia Review, The Rumpus, Shenandoah, Brevity, Fourth Genre and elsewhere. She is a nonfiction editor at r.kv.r.y quarterly , Reviews Editor at Tinderbox Poetry Journal, and a reviewer for The A.V. Club . You can read more of her work at www.randonbillingsnoble.com .

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A meeting place for a world of reflective writers.

The Importance of the Notebook

In this digital world where technology has become such an integral part of our lives, I wonder, is there still room for the notebook?

Last year, I piloted 1:1 laptops in my sixth grade language arts classroom. It goes that whenever I add something to my plate in teaching, something else seems to slip away. Last year, it was the notebook. We used them a lot in the first quarter and after that, barely ever, as all of our writing happened on the computer. I didn’t intend for that to happen, but it did. I missed the notebook and my students did too. When the year ended, I decided to focus on notebook writing along with writing online during the next school year…and I’m much happier with the results.

There’s something about a notebook. I’ve written in notebooks since I was nine years old. My notebook is a safe place for me. It’s where I can celebrate or grieve, where I can vent or grumble. It’s where I untangle my life. My notebook is an extension of me. I must feel the pen crossing the page every single day. How do I share that passion with my students? I share. I model. I write. We write.

A long time ago when I began teaching, I wanted all the notebooks to look the same. I wanted them to have creative titles. I wanted every page to be filled with thoughts of the student. I wanted doodles and word lists and maps and jots and brain dumps and evidence of living the life of a writer. I knew how I wanted the notebooks to look.  It never happened that way. I ran into roadblocks…reluctant writers who resisted the notebook. Why? I didn’t understand it then, but now I recognize the problem. All of those things…that’s what “I wanted”…I needed to allow the students to use their notebooks the way they wanted.

Notebooks this year became a lesson in letting go (for me) and in breaking the rules (for my students). No longer did I want to see neat entries, nor did I want to see the same thing inside each notebook! I want to see the messy thinking. I want to see scribbles and doodles and color and pencil and them…I want to see my students on the pages.

Students begin the year with a blank composition notebook. This is not new to them by the time they reach sixth grade, and because of that they arrive with their own experiences and expectations of what a notebook should be. We talk about what a notebook is and it’s purpose. We write on the very first day of school.

I share my notebooks. I show them entries from the 80s and 90s. We notice how messy my notebooks are and how they have changed over the years. I talk about what notebooks are for me and then the discussion turns to them and their notebooks. My expectations are simple…this notebook is a reflection of them. It shows their thinking, and it collects memories and ideas. I want dates on the pages and a title for the page (so they remember what this entry is)…but everything else is their choice.

Some of my beginning of the year mini-lessons with notebooks include:

Writing utensils: Pen, Pencil, Marker? Color or Black & White?

Ephemera in My Notebook

What’s My Name? Giving a Title to My Notebook

Doodling and Note Taking

Students must try each of these things once, that way they see if it fits for them or not. I compare it to eating vegetables at dinner time when I was a kid. My parents had a rule that I had to take two bites of my vegetables. How would I ever know if I liked green beans if I didn’t try them? It’s the same thing with notebooks. Students must try doodling once while taking notes, but if it doesn’t stick, that’s ok.

As I release the control of the notebooks, I notice that students slowly start to take risks. We share our own personal ways of expressing ourselves on the pages. In the beginning of the year, we watch TED Talks and take notes. The first time we did this, their notes were primarily bullet points of information. As we continue, I encourage them to practice using sketching and doodling along with words. The artistic students love to share their pages and they get a chance to shine! The less artistic students (that includes me), find creative ways to express ourselves even though we lack drawing skills. Our conversations center around the pages in our notebooks, “Why did you draw that?” “How did you think of that?” “I never thought of doing it that way.” We celebrate different ways of representing our thinking.

It’s June and we’ve reached the end of the year. Our notebooks are full and we are reflecting. We are reading our notebooks and noticing how we’ve changed as writers. Getting to watch my students sit together with their notebooks and reread entries from months ago is an opportunity for me to learn more about them as writers. Conferencing with small groups and listening to their discussions teaches me so much.

One of the favorite entries from this year is about the judge. While enjoying our read aloud for writing, Writing Magic by Gail Carson Levine, we talked about our “judge”  when we are writing. We talked about telling the judge to be quiet and allowing our “madman” to take over during the gush of writing .  While we were reading and taking notes on this, students represented the judge visually…

A notebook is a place to collect thoughts and ideas, a place to record memories, a place to take risks and a place to play. My hope is that my students leave knowing more about themselves as writers and as people…that they have used the pages of their notebook to find answers to questions. Have you written in your notebook today?

Michelle Haseltine is in her twentieth year of education. Currently spending her days with sixth graders in Loudoun County, VA reading and writing. Michelle is a Teacher-Consultant with the Northern Virginia Writing Project and continues to search for the book she’s destined to write. She can be found at twitter as @mhaseltine and at her blog One Grateful Teacher .

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41 thoughts on “ The Importance of the Notebook ”

I LOVE THIS POST!! ♥

“I am not in a party, I am a party!”

I’ve been keeping notebooks since I was 11 years old – which was a LOT of years ago – so I have a LOT of notebooks that fill a very large bookshelf. I have so many of them now I wonder what to do with them. Sometimes I will find my kids (who are actually officially adults now) reading one of them and laughing – or even crying. They tell me I should publish them. I never expected anyone would want to read them, but maybe I could blog some of the pages from time to time and see if anyone is interested…. My notebooks and journals have been my creative release, my best friends and my free therapy through all the years. They are a safe place where I can be totally 100% me. Unashamed. Unfiltered. I am so happy that you are teaching children to discover and embrace the joy of keeping notebooks. The act of simply using a pen on paper to express ourselves is a dying art. Thank you for keeping this important gift alive.

I finally got a chance to read this post!! Oh, I have notebook envy!! I need to be in your class in order to establish my own notebook habit. I’ve started and stopped so many notebooks, I’ve lost count. I’ve been doing ALL my writing on the computer, but I know I am missing something by not keeping a notebook, and because I don’t, I haven’t been good at encouraging my students to do so. I have a lot to learn from you! Excellent post.

Michelle, I found the same in my 4th grade classroom. Writing notebooks became google docs this year. I, too, missed the personalized writing notes that appeared in their notebooks. I am going to resurrect my passion for writing notebook this next school year. Doing lots of reading and reflecting on writing workshop this summer as I am ONLY going to be a Lang. Arts teacher next year. First year I’ve released the other content areas to my team. I am saving this wonderful post in my “thinking” files. Thank you! D 🙂

I love this! You are such an inspiration to your students and friends. I, too, love my notebooks and have kept them over the years. My notebooks allow me to stay true to who I am in a world that preaches conformity and at times can bash individuality. Thank you for sharing these inspiring words and honesty.

You are an I aspiration to your students daily. I think the world of you. I, too, have kept my notebooks with quotes and doodles. My notebooks allow me stay true to who I am ina world that is always trying to preach conformity and bash individuality.

I love this post. Notebooks are so important to writers. A place where they can live, experiment, try on ideas, or just breath in and out into the page. Loved to see the student work. Thank you for sharing.

Michelle, I love this post on writing notebooks. I love the playing and the thinking your students are doing. I love how you model being a writer for your students. Your students see a real world use for the notebooks that transcends just your classroom. I can’t wait to blog and fill up my notebook with you during class next month.

I still value the notebooks, but didn’t start them this year when I took over the class & I missed that messing about with writing. We did blog a lot & did the March challenge, so they could experiment with style & content, but it still isn’t the same, I agree, Michelle. We couldn’t examine ideas the same, etc. I love that you returned to the notebook, & wonder what happened to the computer work then? Did it go away? Such a dilemma faces us today! Beautiful post with great examples of joy in this kind of writing! Thank you!

Thank you Linda! I didn’t abandon computer work either…I tried to blend both of them! It’s still a work in progress, but this year felt much better returning to the notebooks!

Michelle-Love, Love, Love your reflection and thinking around having a writing notebook. Your words inspire me to continue and improve the way I have my students think about and use their notebooks. I didn’t introduce the madman, judge, architect ideas and now I sorry I didn’t–Next year!!! 🙂 Thanks for sharing your thoughts and students’ journals.

Thank you! I do walk the talk…I LOVE it and that certainly helps when it comes to sharing notebooks with my students. Thank you for noticing and for your kind comment!

Thanks Laura!! They loved hearing about the judge, architect & madman! When we reflected on notebooks, those were some of our favorite entries!

You can tell you walk the talk Michelle. Everything about this post oozes passion for writing and the value of documenting everyday thoughts. What a wonderful keepsake it is for them to treasure. Passing this on to your students is a true gift for their present and their future. Great post, I loved it. 🙂

I’m delighted to see what an emphasis you’ve put on notebooks with your students, Michelle.

In some places, I feel as though notebooks have gotten short shrift since the adoption of the CCSS (not sure why!) in many writing workshops. This post reminds us to get back to basics with a notebook. Notebooks are such important tools… neglecting them doesn’t help our writers. Thanks for sharing your passion about notebooks here on TWT today.

Thank you, Stacey! Notebooks have been a passion of mine since I was 9 years old and I work hard to pass that on to my students. I’m happy it showed in the post. Thank you for the opportunity!

What a great post, Michelle – I love how you found a way to convey your passion and purposefulness for the notebook to your kids in a way they could own it for themselves. What a powerful lesson!

Tara, I appreciate your kind words! It’s amazing to watch what they create when I step out of the way!

Michelle, your post really spoke to me because, as you know, I am a huge writer’s notebook fan, and the incorporation of technology into my life has made it a bit of a struggle. Kudos to you for recognizing the struggle and remaining true to your roots. Thanks for sharing your thinking and student work here!

Thanks so much Dana! I always love a fellow notebook lover!! We should compare notebooks sometime! 🙂

This awesome post is incredibly timely. I am teaching several two-day writing workshops this summer throughout Iowa and Wisconsin and naturally we address writers’ notebooks. I THOUGHT I had my presentation complete and ready to deliver, but…I was wrong. I love your suggestion about allowing (and encouraging) students to personalize” their notebooks, and I appreciate your tips on beginning-of-the-year mini-lessons. Now it’s MY turn to edit and revise.

Wow, thank you Jacquie! I’m honored that you were so inspired that you’re revising your workshops! Happy Notebook-ing!

I love everything about your post. Thank you for sharing your reflections, photos, your thoughts about notebooks- yours and students- and for your ideas about mini-lessons at the beginning of the year. One of my summer goals is to dive more fully into my own notebook. I haven’t really done that yet and at the moment I am more comfortable composing on a keyboard. But there are times when I want to record or save something or jot down an idea and I don’t want the computer. I would love to know more about your own notebooks and how you use them. How incredible that you are able to share notebooks from many years ago with your sixth grade writers. That must be such a thrill for them. By the way, I’m a huge fan of your blog and read your posts regularly. Wish we were closer (you are in Loudon and I am in Charlottesville) and could connect.

Lisa, Charlottesville isn’t too far away!! I’d love to connect!!! Let’s brainstorm something soon! Thank you for your compliments! Enjoy your notebook diving…have fun with it and give yourself permission to PLAY! Your questions have another blog post brewing already!! The most important thing about my notebooks is there are no rules…or rather, I MAKE the rules! Make your own rules and don’t be afraid to break them! My students love reading my old notebooks. They LAUGH!!! Thanks for the comment and I hope we connect SOON!

Michelle, I have 2:1 (devices to students) and have been grateful for that! It forced me not to go 100% digital. Some days I’d tell students I forgot to charge the iPads, or another teacher borrowed them just to get them ALL notebooking! As adults, we can see the power of doodling and reflecting that exist in the notebook. The need to keep that physical playground where the words we write have color and a personality is important.

I agree, there is “something” about notebooks for our writing lives. Your love of notebooking comes out loud and clear to your students and it shows in their work. I love how you take students on a journey of cautious boxes and bullets style notetaking to bold colorful creative thinking notebookers. It’s always such a pleasure to read about your beautiful classroom. Julieanne

Julieanne, Haha! There are days when I need a break from the digital world (as much as I LOVE it)! Thank you for your encouraging comment and I’m glad you enjoyed seeing their journey!!! My students were excited that others were seeing their notebook pages! They feel famous!

Notebooks are my new obsession. I challenged my students to write in a notebook all summer so they’d have lots of ideas when they come back to school and start Small Moment writing. Amy Ludwig Vanderwater and I started a cache of ideas for Notebooking over at http://www.sharingournotebooks.amylv.com/p/summer-notebooking-try-it.html

Oh how I’d love to hear about their summer writing! I challenged my sixth graders too, but with 100 students, it’s almost impossible to follow up on that challenge. I love Sharing Our Notebooks!! I must head over there soon and catch up on the posts! Thank you for commenting!

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I love this post. Our notebooks need to be places where we allow the freedom to just be and express. I have never graded notebooks for this very reason. I’m so glad you discovered their place in your classroom and didn’t throw them out when digital writing happened. My favorite picture is the judgy monster.

Thanks Margaret! The judge pictures were all so wonderful I had a tough time picking which one to share! They had a lot to say about their judges!! Thanks for the comment!

Wow! Awesome post, Michele! Notebooks are something I’ve always struggled with and I think you just showed me why — they were more about me and what I wanted in them, and not about my students. I think you may have just discovered a topic for that book you are waiting to write. FLY!!

Jennifer, It took me such a long time to stumble upon that idea and turn the notebooks around and focus on them! Your encouragement about this being a book is overwhelming and wonderful! Thank you!

I love the peek into your students’ notebooks! Such good work here, Michelle.

Lee Ann, Thanks so much! That means a lot!!

I love how your mini lessons teach students how to play in their notebook and make it their own. I’m sure their growth as a writer is obvious as students look back to entries from the beginning of the year.

Thank you Jenny! Yes, to see their growth is so powerful for me and for them too!!

Great post, Michelle! As you know, I have been struggling to make my students take more ownership of their writing notebooks. Your article will certainly help. Thanks!

Thank you Melanie! I’m so glad this will help you!

It’s such a pleasure to read your writing, Michelle, as you tell the story of your teaching and your students so masterfully! I love seeing the samples of their notebook pages and having them take notes during TED talks is a fantastic idea (love that Kid President!). Sharing your passion for writing and specifically writing in a notebook is powerful. I love that you do a writing read aloud and now I need to check out Writing Magic, too. So much to love about this post and so much to think about. This summer, I really wanted to try to rediscover my writers notebook. I’ve been doing almost all of my writing digitally and I feel like I need to live in the notebook so I can share more authentically with my students. Do you have your students decorate the notebook with pictures and artifacts early in the year or do they gradually add to it? Thanks for reminding us of the power that lies in a Writer’s Notebook.

Kathleen, Thank you for your comment! Writing Magic is awesome and so is her other book about writing, Writer to Writer! In the beginning of the year, we spend some time talking about personalizing and I show examples. They make their own choices. Some go crazy with scrapbooking materials and pictures, some illustrate and some leave it mostly plain. I insist on a title…that’s a minilesson. We continue to add ephemera all year long!

Michelle, How awesome that you can have both the physical notebooks and the digital work of students. My favorite lines are . . . “All of those things…that’s what “I wanted”…I needed to allow the students to use their notebooks the way they wanted.”

And of course the eating vegetables analogy! It’s so important to let the students figure out what works for them and “learning” to let go of teacher control is a parat of that.

Great guest blog . . . Thanks for sharing student work! This has been a great series!

Fran, Thank you for your comment! The blending of the physical notebooks and the digital writing has been challenging, but so worth it! Looking at the notebooks in June, I see such growth!!

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Creativity during the pandemic: Why you should keep a notebook

I had tried to keep a notebook before. It never worked — it was as if my mind ran out of sentences. Diaries would trail off after a few weeks, and my thought fragments would transition to the Notes app. It felt burdensome to do more; unsheathing a notebook for a floating idea was too much. That is, until I read Joan Didion’s essay “On Keeping a Notebook.”

Didion did not reconstruct her day in her notebook, as I believed I should do. She wrote down disconnected details, unnecessary slivers of her life that only held meaning to her (a “dirty crepe-de-chine wrapper”). When she read it, her mind recreated the scene — a moment that swelled into a sort of reality beyond petty facts. She logged these facts whenever the scene struck her, not superimposed by any schedule or dates. I wanted that for myself.

My details are different than Didion’s, but they hold the same order. Whenever a moment pierces my stream of thought, I note it down. When my knee clicked while I was stretching, I opened up the notebook: “joints grinding as mortar and pestle.” When I noticed a fluttering crow, I wrote it down: “an object of tar, charred and angry.”

These thoughts are detached, a futile exercise of creativity. They will not be nonfiction scenes, as they were for Didion. But they do harbor some secret value, only accessible by me.

I used to sit in museum galleries and muse on paintings, and observe my environs as I biked to school. My eyes would settle on peculiar people, and my mind would shoot off a salvo of creative sentences. The simplest routines, the acts of observation, were moments of artistic reflection and clarity. Now, my routines are slashed to the very minimum, just movements within the household. I sit in my bedroom, poring over my computer for a daily average of 14 hours (how is that possible?). And the only place I can spar with my creativity is in my notebook. 

The writings in the notebook memorialize thoughts I previously escorted out. They are peaks of artistic inclination, places where creative consciousness crosses the matter-of-fact mind. During my past routines, I regularly discarded these thoughts, and considered them only during dedicated writing periods. But, since I have been confined by shelter in place, I need more reminders of my creative humanity. I achieve that by writing all those moments down.

It’s curious to read the scrawlings back, too. I recognize what I like to observe — emotions, movements, beings. There’s an element of mobility to it, continuous change. Life is still in flux during societal stillness, and I want to write about it. This rereading unearths my personal definition of creative writing, which I could not understand before. I enjoy writing about texture, taste, color. I enjoy making comparisons. I love describing nature and anatomy more than anything. If creativity is an investigation of yourself, then your notebook is your evidence.

Of course, I’m also investigating other people and objects. I have to pay attention to the external world, to decenter myself and make room for other things. I can escape the traps in my psyche (perfectionism, overestimation, excessive drama) and be present. There is no judgement when I write in my notebook. They are private musings about the richness around me, without any calculation of their utility and worth. My notebook process is smooth and instinctual, and it is reserved for my enjoyment, not anyone else’s.  

Without creative stimuli, we must stimulate ourselves and rejoice in it. Instead of dismissing random thoughts, we should nurse them and write them down. Otherwise, we start invalidating our artistry, which would truly put the world at a loss. 

Contact Diana Piper at dianapiper ‘at’ gmail.com.

Diana Piper is a high schooler writing as part of The Daily’s Summer Journalism Workshop.

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Nicole Bianchi

Writing, Copywriting, & Marketing Strategies

How to Keep a Writing Notebook: A Peek into the Notebooks of Famous Writers & Thinkers

Published March 28, 2016 | Last Updated April 11, 2024 By Nicole Bianchi 57 Comments

Ever have one of those days?

You need to write a new blog post, but you can’t think of any interesting ideas. Or maybe you’re trying to write a short story but can’t get past the first line.

What do you do when you run up against a creative block?

Many famous writers would have reached for their writing notebooks. W. Somerset Maugham, Mark Twain, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Joan Didion, John Steinbeck, and Damon Knight are among the famous writers who kept a notebook to collect ideas and help them out of creative ruts.

Today, let’s take a peek into the notebooks of famous writers and thinkers to see the many different ways we can use a physical notebook or a note taking app on a computer or smartphone to boost creativity and beat writer’s block.

1. Use a Writing Notebook Whenever Inspiration Hits

It’s probably happened to you at some point. You’re far away from your computer, maybe shopping at the store or riding the train home from work, when suddenly you think up a new blog post idea or idea for a short story.

Rather than losing the idea forever (the short-term memory only retains information for three minutes unless reinforced ), you can jot it down in your notebook.

A small notebook can be easily slipped into a purse or a jacket pocket. Alternatively, you can use a note taking app on your smartphone (I love Evernote) that will sync with your computer.

If you’re driving a car when inspiration hits, you can get even more creative and use a voice recording app to capture your ideas without taking your hands off the wheel. An iPhone, for example, can be voice activated using Siri.

Ernest Hemingway carried a notebook with him constantly. In A Moveable Feast (affiliate link) , he wrote, “I belong to this notebook and this pencil.” Check out a page from one of his small notebooks here .

In Damon Knight’s book Creating Short Fiction (affiliate link) , he wrote, “Keep a notebook handy or carry it with you so that you can jot down thoughts that occur to you at odd moments.”

In his book A Writer’s Notebook (affiliate link) , W. Somerset Maugham observed how keeping a notebook forced him to clarify his thoughts. He wrote,

By making a note of something that strikes you, you separate it from the incessant stream of impressions that crowd across the mental eye, and perhaps fix it in your memory. All of us have had good ideas or vivid sensations that we thought would one day come in useful, but which, because we were too lazy to write them down, have entirely escaped us. When you know you are going to make a note of something, you look at it more attentively than you otherwise would, and in the process of doing so the words are borne in upon you that will give it its private place in reality.

Keeping this kind of a notebook encourages you to be curious, ask questions about the world, think innovatively, and find creative solutions to the problems you encounter.

2. Use a Writing Notebook to Brainstorm

Mark Twain was a big fan of pocket notebooks as well. In this picture , you can see two pages in his notebook where he wrote up a list of potential names for characters in a story.

Ralph Waldo Emerson was another prolific note taker; his  journals (affiliate link) ended up reaching sixteen volumes. They are filled with many observations that later served as the foundation for his other literary works.

W. Somerset Maugham used his notebook in this way as well. He wrote (affiliate link),

As I grew older and more aware of my intentions, I used my notebooks less to record my private opinions, and more to put down while still fresh my impressions of such persons and places as seemed likely to be of service to me for the particular purpose I had in view at the moment… I have never claimed to create anything out of nothing; I have always needed an incident or a character as a starting point, but I have exercised imagination, invention and a sense of the dramatic to make it something of my own.

Essentially, the notebook exists as a private place to plant your ideas and watch them grow. It’s the perfect place to work on plotting a novel or writing up a rough outline of a blog post.

3. Use a Writing Notebook to Collect Research

Leonardo da Vinci was another one of the most famous note keepers in history. He filled hundreds of pages with sketches, scientific diagrams, ideas for new inventions, and reflections on art. These pages weren’t bound together as books until after his death.

Because da Vinci was left-handed, he found it easier to write from right to left. That means his notes can only be read in a mirror. To make his writings even more private, he often employed a kind of shorthand and didn’t worry about perfect penmanship or proper punctuation.

What he did care about was carefully recording his lab notes and his many ideas for new inventions: everything from a flying machine to a submarine prototype. (Check out a page from one his notebooks here .)

Similarly, during Charles Darwin’s voyage on the HMS  Beagle , he kept a series of field notebooks that he filled with his scientific observations. Below is a page from one of the books:

The philosopher Blaise Pascal also carefully wrote down his research and observations. The Pensées (affiliate link), published after his death, is a collection of the many thoughts on philosophy and theology that he jotted down on scraps of paper as he prepared a defense of Christianity. You can see one of those scraps of paper here .

Whether you’re researching an article or a novel, you need a place where you can organize all of that material.

When I’m working on a blog post, I use Evernote. I have found this app to be the perfect place to store the many articles and quotes I collect. Evernote has a feature that allows you to save anything you see online—including text, links, and images—into your Evernote account with a single click.

Alternatively, if you are working on a novel or any kind of book-length manuscript, you can use Scrivener . I love this app as it allows you to outline and structure your ideas, take notes, and view research alongside your writing.

4. Use a Writing Notebook to Warm Up Your Writing Muscle

This photo shows a page from one of Thomas Edison’s many notebooks.

He writes at the top of the page: things doing and to be done. His to-do list runs for several pages and includes an amazing number of ideas, including an electrical piano, “unflammable” insulating material, ink for the blind, and an apparatus to help the deaf.

Thomas Edison may not have written any significant literary works, but he was one of the most prolific inventors in American history. He held 1,093 different patents. Edison’s to-do list shows how we can use our own notebooks to warm up our creative muscle.

Here’s what I do. Each morning before diving into my writing projects, I spend some time free writing. Usually, I free write about the writing project I am about to tackle. This helps me get myself into writing mode and avoid procrastination. I list my goals and start working towards them.

You can free write in a Word Document or use a program like  Draftin , an easy to use and distraction-free web-based writing interface that allows you to use folders to organize your writing.

5. Use a Writing Notebook to Journal Your Writing Project

John Steinbeck began writing The Grapes of Wrath (affiliate link) in 1938. He thought it would be helpful to keep a daily diary (affiliate link) to record his progress.

He wrote, “I shall try simply to keep a record of working days and the amount done in each and the success (as far as I can know it) of the day. Just now the work goes well.”

The diary helped him spill out his self doubt on paper so he could turn his full attention to his novel.

At one point, he wrote,

So many things to drive me nuts… I’m afraid this book is going to pieces. If it does, I do too… If only I wouldn’t take this book so seriously. It is just a book after all, and a book is very dead in a very short time. And I’ll be dead in a very short time too. So the hell with it. Let’s slow down, not in pace or wordage but in nerves.

You can take a peek into the diary here .

The Morgan Library also has a fascinating  podcast of an actor reading portions of the diary.

When Steinbeck wrote East of Eden (affiliate link), he continued his practice of recording his novel’s progress, though this time he did not keep a diary but sent letters (affiliate link) to his editor instead.

Elizabeth George copied Steinbeck’s practice of journaling his novel.

In her book Write Away (affiliate link) , she observes,

For the last three or four novels, I’ve copied John Steinbeck’s activity from East of Eden , and I’ve begun every day by writing in a journal, sometimes about the writing I’m doing, sometimes about what’s on my mind at the moment. So for each novel I now write, I create a new journal entry, but before I do that, I read a day in the last Journal of a Novel for the previous novel. This allows me to see that, whatever I might be experiencing at the moment, I have experienced it and survived it before.

I have adopted Steinbeck’s and George’s practice as well.  Although I used to love keeping a physical journal, my days are much busier now, and I find that I can write much faster when I am typing. I journal using an app called Day One that has a simple and elegant interface.

My novel is still in the plotting stages, but journaling each day helps me see that I am making progress. Like Steinbeck, it allows me to rid myself of negative thoughts, and as Elizabeth George wrote, it will be a helpful record when I start working on a second novel.

You can journal any writing project: a novel, a nonfiction book, a new blog. This kind of a notebook helps you avoid repeating mistakes in the future. Reading through your past experiences allows you to see all the steps you took towards accomplishing your goals.

The Takeaway

In Joan Didion’s essay on why she keeps a notebook, she writes, “How it felt to me: that is getting closer to the truth about a notebook…Remember what it was to be me: that is always the point.”

Ultimately, a notebook is a portable laboratory where we can record our own unique perspective on the world, jot down the things in our lives that awaken our Muse, and experiment with new ideas.

As Ray Bradbury observed in his book Zen in the Art of Writing (affiliate link), “We never sit anything out. We are cups, quietly and constantly being filled. The trick is knowing how to tip ourselves over and let the beautiful stuff out.”

Keeping notebooks helps us collect all of the beautiful stuff that we experience in our lives so we can share it with the world.

What is your writing notebook like? Do you keep a physical notebook or use apps on your smartphone and computer? Leave your thoughts in the comments and share this post with someone you would like to inspire.

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February 16, 2023 at 5:18 pm

Davinci wasn’t left handed and Edison only invented patten theft.

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akbarmontada says

December 15, 2019 at 6:27 pm

I was wondering if you ever thought of changing the layout of your site?

Its very well written; I love what youve got to say. But maybe you could a little more in the way of content so people could connect with it better. Youve got an awful lot of text for only having 1 or two pictures. Maybe you could space it out better?

Erasable Notebook says

April 14, 2019 at 2:46 pm

Highly appreciate your article and the thought behind it. A small pocket notebook is one of my essentials as I keep on writing whatever I get interested from this world.

REV. E. A. HERNANDEZ says

August 6, 2018 at 2:28 am

A cut-in-half check register, a fine old ballpoint pen refill (keep the pen), and my universe becomes yours.

Mahrker says

November 20, 2017 at 9:23 pm

Hello Nicole, The way you wrote about important of notebooks is awesome. I totally agree for Brainstorm writing notebooks helps a lot with some many ideas that can write and recall. keep up the good work.

Marcia. says

April 10, 2017 at 9:41 pm

Great article Nicole. Good reminder for me and what a surprise to see the writings of Thomas Edison. I have a diary by my bed but I don’t write everyday. I think my diary is trying to speak through you, telling me to write everyday.

I’ve read the book “Write It Down, Make It Happen by Henriette Anne Klauser that sparkled my interest in writing. I bought my first diary in 2.011 for my birthday after my mom passed away with cancer. I needed a place to park my thoughts and feelings. After that I got hooked and I made scrapbook diaries for my niece, nephew and brother. I’m passing on the inspiration and creativity.

The scrapbook diaries that I made for them contains photos, newspapers articles, words of inspiration, prayers, quotes from the bible, greeting cards, postcards, lots of stickers, funny book markers, healthy recipes, cartoons, and I write all the things that I’d like to tell them in a fun diary for them. Sometimes people and young teenagers forget what we try to tell them.

I agree, there’s something about a pen, a paper and your own handwriting. Thanks for the post.

Nicole Bianchi says

April 28, 2017 at 1:21 pm

Hi, Marcia! Thank you so much for your comment. 🙂 Love how you make scrapbook diaries! That is such a wonderful way to preserve memories and special events and anything else you want to pass down. I’m sure your niece and nephew and brother will treasure them. (Also, I haven’t read Write it Down, Make it Happen . Sounds like a great book!)

bob soltys says

December 9, 2016 at 1:46 pm

Thank you for a fascinating post, Nicole.

Fountain pen and paper, for morning pages – and in a Rhodia No. 12 dotpad that’s always with my camera and me, and lately, in the How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci Notebook / Workbook.

Carrying a notebook is essential for jotting down things that come to mind, and even for drawing, for example the fish in the tank at the doctor’s office.

Ideas flow better from pen to paper, and I’m free of the distractions of email and the internet.

Best wishes for your novel. It’s obvious from the writing in your blog posts that it will be a success.

December 11, 2016 at 2:43 pm

Thank you so much for your kind words, Bob! I was not familiar with the “How to Think Like Leonardo da Vinci’ notebook. I just looked it up on Amazon, and it looks very cool.

September 19, 2016 at 12:58 pm

Really loved reading this post. I prefer to keep my notes in physical notebooks, I just really love the feeling of pen on paper. Like you, I have a writing routine to start my day. I’ve embarked on Julia Cameron’s The Artist Way and I do the Morning Pages exercise – write 3 pages, by hand, in an 8.5×11″notebook as the first thing you do when you wake up. I absolutely love this exercise to brain dump everything left over from the day before, making notes about weird dreams, or just trying to get myself organised for the day.

Thanks for this round up!

September 23, 2016 at 9:15 pm

Hi, Darya! Thank you so much for your comment. I really need to get back to keeping a physical notebook. Typing really can’t compare with writing on paper. I do try to journal each morning with a computer app called Day One. Love how you describe it as a brain dump. It helps so much in clearing the brain and helping you focus on your writing for the day. Thanks again for your comment! So nice to “meet” you. 🙂

June 16, 2016 at 6:59 am

To take down random notes I tend to use the Notes app on my iphone. I recently started using Evernote on my computer, so it would make sense to use Evernote on the phone as well. However, I’m still wired to click on the Notes app for adding notes when inspiration strikes. This is an awesome post! And I’m definitely subscribing to your newsletter. I recently wrote a post on journaling, drop by whenever you have the time; http://ahscribbles.com/your-first-step-to-being-a-renaissance-woman/

June 17, 2016 at 1:37 pm

Loved your post! Just left a comment. 🙂 And thanks so much for subscribing. I’m glad you found my blog! It’s so nice to “meet” you. 😀

MaryEllen Miller says

April 21, 2016 at 4:29 pm

Love this. My notebook looks exactly like the last picture! A red moleskine. I find that my thoughts flow more freely when they are hand written rather than typed. There is something about pen and paper that doesn’t duplicate electronically. My biggest challenge is that many ideas come to me in the shower…..I need a waterproof slate. 🙂

April 25, 2016 at 1:36 pm

Hi, MaryEllen! Thanks so much for your comment. That’s so cool you have the same notebook as the picture. I love moleskines – I have a black one. 🙂 So true that there is something special about pen and paper. And I definitely hear you about the waterproof slate. 😉

Jeana (@hotcocoareads) says

April 18, 2016 at 9:15 pm

This is fascinating! I keep a small notebook in my purse (and one by my reading table) so I can jot stuff down. And sometimes, I love just seeing my own handwriting—not a font!

April 19, 2016 at 10:11 pm

Thank you so much, Jeana! 🙂 I love small notebooks and have several of them. Unfortunately, though, I’ve gotten out of the habit of writing in them. But I love what you said about seeing your own handwriting, not a font. This is inspiring me to pick up pen and paper again! 😀

Tony Pfeiffer says

April 4, 2016 at 1:25 pm

Nicole, this is well written and inspiring! The capture of the notebooks makes this piece personal. Like we are looking over the shoulders. Way Cool!

April 9, 2016 at 1:57 pm

Hi, Tony! Thanks so much! So happy to hear you found it inspiring. 😀

Ellen Read says

April 4, 2016 at 12:21 am

Well done, Nicole, and thank you. I enjoyed reading your post. I especially liked seeing pages from the notebooks of well-known much-loved writers. I pinned a few to my Pinterest boards. I loved also seeing Edison’s notebook and Leonardo da Vinci’s. They were both creative men. Leonardo, a genius!

I used to hand write all my notes. I love notebooks. These days I still hand write some notes but I do use electronic notes too. If I want to write something down while I’m out, I use my iPhone’s Notes. I also take photos. I’m a very visual person and if I see a building or a statue that captures my imagination, I photograph it.

When I writing, each day I keep a record of how many words I write, how many words that brings the total manuscript to and I list the chapters. I do this with every draft and even in to the editing stage. I can see my progression and it helps me by reinforcing that I’m getting enough work done.

I do have Scrivener but I don’t use it to its full potential.

It’s essential to write thoughts and ideas down. Even if I’ve gone to bed and I think of something, I get up and write it down.

Cheers, Ellen

April 9, 2016 at 1:53 pm

Hi, Ellen! Thank you so much for taking time to read and comment. I am so glad you enjoyed the post. These notebooks are fascinating – I wish I could flip through them and see more pages. 🙂

I use the notes app on my iPhone too. It’s such a quick way to jot down thoughts. I love that you take photos of things that capture your imagination. The novelist Elizabeth George uses a similar technique. I recently read her book Write Away , and she talks about how she’ll visit the place where she wants to set her novels and take lots of photos. Then when she’s writing her novel, she’ll look at these photos to help her describe the setting.

Do you have a target word count for each day and for the entire novel? I need to be very intentional about tracking my progress as well.

And I too need to spend more time taking advantage of all of Scrivener’s features. It’s such a fantastic tool.

Thanks again for visiting the blog! 🙂

April 9, 2016 at 7:53 pm

Hello Nicole. Taking photos is essential for me. I’m a very visual person and when I’m writing I need to ‘see’ every aspect of my location/house etc. When I’m writing the first and second draft, I set a word count of 500. I usually write a lot more, often 2,000 words but I try to be kind to myself. I’m not good at setting a word count for the entire book, not in the beginning. I just write and see where it takes me. For the novel I’m working on at present, I estimated it would probably be about 70,000 – 80,000 words, and it’s 88,000-odd – I’m still editing. So I’m happy enough with that. Cheers, Ellen 🙂

April 11, 2016 at 3:48 pm

Thanks for sharing! 🙂 500 is my minimum word count too, but I usually write much more than that. I like that you don’t set a word count for your book but just wait and see how it unfolds. I’ve found that a short story can turn into a much longer piece and sometimes what I thought would be an interesting idea for a novel can be told in a shorter number of pages. 🙂 Your new book sounds fantastic — you’re inspiring me to take some time to work on mine right now. 😉

April 11, 2016 at 7:25 pm

Thanks, Nicole, and I’m pleased you feel inspired to work on your own book. I think that’s what’s great about sharing our thoughts etc. Cheers, Ellen 🙂

Dolores says

April 3, 2016 at 2:58 pm

I loved this article, Nicole! How thorough and well done. I loved that you mentioned Charles Darwin in it. Without notebooks I will achieve nothing, since I am deeply connected to the pen or the pencil. The computer blocks my brain. It is great to know that you love Evernote. I downloaded it a while ago but never used it. Maybe I will try it. I use sometimes, but only for short works, an app called Dragon for dictation. It works fine and gets the words correctly. Also loved that you mentioned da Vinci. I am left handed and often write in an awkward order. It is something I don’t think about but I just do. And definitely I need a notebook with me at all times. No exceptions! Wonderful, wonderful work. I will wait for my next lesson on writing. Have a wonderful day, Dolores

April 3, 2016 at 11:44 pm

Thank you so much, Dolores! 😀 I always love reading your comments.

Your notebooks sound wonderful. I need to get back to writing by hand – I mostly just write on the computer, but I miss pen & paper. Thanks for recommending the Dragon app for dictation! I will have to check it out. I spend a lot of time staring at the computer screen so it sounds like that would be a great way to give my eyes a rest. How interesting that you also have a unique way of writing like Da Vinci.

You are so kind. It always makes me so happy to know my posts are being enjoyed. Thank you again! Have a lovely week! 🙂

lovelyn says

April 3, 2016 at 11:56 am

A great read! Thank you very much Nicole for sharing these beautiful ideas. You’ve inspired the writer in me.

April 3, 2016 at 1:08 pm

So happy it inspired you! 😀 Thank you so much for your kind words. Do you keep a writing notebook?

Penchie says

April 3, 2016 at 9:25 am

I really enjoyed reading this post. I love the idea of keeping a notebook to jot down thoughts, ideas or inspirations which can be used for future articles, stories, blog posts, etc. I keep a journal and I also keep a small notebook in my bag all the time.

April 3, 2016 at 1:07 pm

Thank you so much, Penchie! 😀 I’m so glad you enjoyed it. I really find that having these notebooks helps me avoid running out of ideas for my posts. I love how you keep a small notebook in your bag at all times.

David Mike says

April 3, 2016 at 8:25 am

I love Evernote so much that I have a hard time writing in a notebook.

April 3, 2016 at 1:05 pm

That’s what happened to me too! 😀 I used to keep physical notebooks but have just found it so much easier and quicker to type things up on the computer or on my smartphone.

Jim Little says

July 10, 2022 at 6:02 pm

It is remarkable that John Steinbeck could have thought that Grapes of Wrath was “just a book” and that it would die in a very short time. “Just a book” became one of the Canon of American literature as well as a biting social commentary still applicable today.

Nerdy Creator says

April 3, 2016 at 12:36 am

I tried using Evernote, but I love my pen and paper too much. So I stop using Evernote. It’s just so much easier to write with pen and paper. I have them near my bed so when inspiration strikes at night, I could scribble something in the dark. I realize light (even from the smartphone) sometimes make me lose my ideas.

April 3, 2016 at 1:02 pm

Thanks for your comment! Yes, often pen and paper is the best way to go for those unexpected moments of inspiration. And I absolutely agree with you about not wanting to stare at a smartphone screen in the middle of the night. I actually wrote a post here about the negative effects of blue light from computer and smart phone screens late at night. I keep a pen and paper next to my bed too!

Jodi Heisz says

April 2, 2016 at 11:29 pm

I am trying to use Evernote more often, but I always carry a notebook with me. I also find it easier to write after some free writing. Natalie Goldberg’s book, Writing Down the Bones, teaches on how to free write. This post was very informative!

April 2, 2016 at 11:56 pm

Hi, Jodi! Thanks for commenting and sharing your thoughts. 😀 I find free writing so helpful. That sounds like a fascinating book. I will have to check it out. Thank you for the recommendation!

Patrice says

April 2, 2016 at 10:49 pm

OMG!! Thank you so much!!! With all the technology going around, I am glad to know there are still some people who love the old school stuff!!

April 2, 2016 at 11:52 pm

Thank so much for your comment, Patrice! 😀 I am so glad you enjoyed the post. Looking at the work processes of famous writers from the past is so inspiring. We can learn so much from them.

Kiki Stamatiou says

April 2, 2016 at 8:16 pm

I handwrite my thoughts and analysis in a notebook. I also use the Evernote app and Google Doc app on my SmartPhone.

April 2, 2016 at 8:45 pm

Hi, Kiki! Thanks for your comment! 🙂 I love that you keep a physical notebook and also use computer and smartphone apps. I need to get back to keeping a physical notebook. I really miss writing by hand every day.

March 29, 2016 at 2:56 pm

Great finds. I’m going title my next list “Things doing and to be done” as well! S.

March 29, 2016 at 6:54 pm

Thanks, Sean! Awesome. I love how Edison titled his list. 😀

March 29, 2016 at 12:20 pm

This is fantastic! You always have something to share that is encouraging and inspiring! I keep a notebook and a journal though neither of them are as consistent as I’d like. The journal is on my computer. I just write about life in general which includes my writing. I like the idea of keeping a journal specific to your novel that tracks progress and helps you get out your frustrations about it specifically! Going to have to try that! Thanks for sharing, Nicole!

March 29, 2016 at 6:52 pm

Hi, Karli! Thank you so much! 😀 It’s always so encouraging to hear that my posts are inspiring others.

Isn’t Steinbeck’s method fantastic? I really struggle with perfectionism when I write so I think this is a wonderful way to overcome that. It lets me remove all of that fear and self-doubt before I begin working on the novel. It’s also a great place to free write about characters and the plot. And, as Elizabeth George pointed out, I think it will be very helpful in the future as moral support when I start working on a second book. Hope the writing of your novel is going well!

Veronica says

March 29, 2016 at 6:04 am

This is beautiful! I love this idea – going through the different writers across a vast period of time and comparing it to now is just amazing. Great post! Awesome read 🙂

March 29, 2016 at 6:39 pm

Thanks so much for your kind words, Veronica! 🙂 I am so happy to hear you enjoyed the post!

I find it so encouraging to see that writers in the past struggled with the same difficulties as writers today. It’s so neat that we can still use their strategies for overcoming those difficulties — just need to update the strategies to fit 21st century technology. 😀

reagan says

March 28, 2016 at 7:53 pm

Wow, this is so awesome! I love how you compiled all of these famous writers’ notebooks into one post! I do have a writing notebook! Well, not exactly a notebook. I used to keep it on paper, then I got a laptop, and now it’s a series of word documents that I’ve called “Tidbits”. It’s anything and everything that I write that I wouldn’t show anyone! But it’s where most of my writing ideas have come from.

March 29, 2016 at 6:19 pm

Hi, Reagan! Thanks so much for reading. 🙂 Your writing notebook sounds fantastic. I have a similar folder on my computer. I like that you call yours “tidbits”. It’s so wonderful to have a space like that where you can write about anything without worries about it being perfect or about others reading it. It really allows your brain to just be as creative as possible. 😀

March 29, 2016 at 6:34 pm

Cynthia P. says

March 28, 2016 at 7:23 pm

Your post is fantastic Nicole. So many good ideas. Had never heard of apps like Evernote, that sounds great. If you can put in anything you come across online, that would be wonderful. I see so many inspiring things, but you can’t always write them down, it takes too long, then you forget them. Will have to reread some of your ideas, and implement some of them. Thank you for the knowledge you are imparting to others.My problem is I’m not that technology savvy and need to improve that.

March 29, 2016 at 6:14 pm

Hi, Cynthia! So glad you found the post helpful. 😀 Evernote is such a great app, and it’s free! I also love to use it for writing up to-do lists. It’s definitely worth checking out. This is the link about the web clipper feature that lets you save webpages for reading later: https://evernote.com/webclipper/

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This Joan Didion Essay Will Change The Way You Feel About Keeping A Notebook

As a kid, I was a sucker for writing in notebooks . Maybe it was the first sign of the career path I would eventually take as an adult or maybe it was just inspired by a brief but powerful obsession with the Harriet the Spy film. Whatever the case, I would spend hours tethered to my notebooks, writing down my thoughts and feelings and drawing doodles. I even wrote an entire children's book once. But it wasn't long after that, as a teenager, that I quit the habit altogether, and trashed all of the notebooks I had filled up. But even though I'd stopped writing in notebooks, I was actually writing more than ever — articles, essays, features, fiction — and I was surrounded by more writers than I ever had been in my life. And guess what? Almost all of them had notebooks.

They had big, bulky ones on their desks, small spiral ones they tucked into their purses or back pockets, should they need to write some brilliant thought down on-the-go. I read about famous writers who never went anywhere without a notebook, watched fellow creatives on public transportation constantly writing, sketching, thinking. And I started to wonder what was wrong with me. Why didn't I seem to take as much stock in notebooks as everyone else? It was Joan Didion 's famous essay "On Keeping A Notebook" from Slouching Towards Bethlehem — basically required reading young journalists everywhere — that made me rethink my relationship with the humble notebook. And it might just inspire you to start jotting things down this year, too.

Didion writes:

"Why did I write it down? In order to remember, of course, but exactly what was it I wanted to remember? How much of it actually happened? Did any of it? Why do I keep a notebook at all? It is easy to deceive oneself on all those scores. The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself. I suppose that it begins or does not begin in the cradle. Although I have felt compelled to write things down since I was five years old, I doubt that my daughter ever will, for she is a singularly blessed and accepting child, delighted with life exactly as life presents itself to her, unafraid to go to sleep and unafraid to wake up. Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss."

This predicament sounded all too familiar to me upon first reading Didion's essay. My first impulse is to write in order to remember. But when you finally get down to the reality of what that means — reliving the hardest days, trying to capture the happiest — it can be difficult to sit down and write. And what happens when you do get past that initial hesitation? Do you want to hold a tangible artifact in your hand that captures down to factual detail, every single day? Yeah, neither do I. And neither did Didion.

Slouching Towards Bethlehem by Joan Didion , $10.20, Amazon

She writes:

"So the point of my keeping a notebook has never been, nor is it now, to have an accurate factual record of what I have been doing or thinking. That would be a different impulse entirely, an instinct for reality which I sometimes envy but do not possess. At no point have I ever been able successfully to keep a diary; my approach to daily life ranges from the grossly negligent to the merely absent, and on those few occasions when I have tried dutifully to record a day’s events, boredom has so overcome me that the results are mysterious at best. What is this business about 'shopping, typing piece, dinner with E, depressed'? Shopping for what? Typing what piece? Who is E? Was this 'E' depressed, or was I depressed? Who cares?"

So, we're definitely on the same page. Keeping a diary can be droll, and can feel somewhat meaningless. I have always felt that if a memory were so strong that I wanted to capture it on paper, I wouldn't necessarily need to. And everything else? All of the minutiae of my day to day existence? Well, who cares? But if that's the case... what, then, is the point of keeping a notebook? For me, it came down to rethinking what a notebook is supposed to be, and what it is supposed to capture.

"How it felt to me : that is getting closer to the truth about a notebook. I sometimes delude myself about why I keep a notebook, imagine that some thrifty virtue derives from preserving everything observed. See enough and write it down, I tell myself, and then some morning when the world seems drained of wonder, some day when I am only going through the motions of doing what I am supposed to do, which is write — on that bankrupt morning I will simply open my notebook and there it will all be, a forgotten account with accumulated interest, paid passage back to the world out there."

And, there it was: my own lightbulb moment. There is the real reason why Harriet wrote down all those private goings-on between her classmates and neighbors. There was the reason why all of my co-workers and friends were packing composition notebooks and pens wherever they went. Writing things down is not about capturing every fleeting moment or remembering every experience down to accurate timestamps. It's about figuring out how you feel about your life, what you think about the things you see and the the conversations you have — or overhear. Because knowing what you feel and think? Well, that's knowing yourself.

"I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind’s door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were...It is a good idea, then, to keep in touch, and I suppose that keeping in touch is what notebooks are all about."

And so I tried to forget about all of those old notebooks — all of those old me's — I'd disregarded and tossed away. I let go of my impulse to use a notebook as an hour by hour recap of my day, and instead thought of it as capturing a snapshot of who I am right now, at this very moment. Jotting down the thoughts I have now, the things that surprise me today, the moments that inspire me throughout the year.

I've been going strong with my notebook — a red floral number that I had to work up the courage to write in for the first time — for a few months now. It hasn't helped me remember what I was wearing last Tuesday, or the exact wording of the joke my friend told that made me cry with laughter, but it is helping me keep in touch with myself. And something tells me I'll always be thankful for that, no matter what my notebook says.

Why it's important to keep a notebook

It is a good idea to keep in touch with old selves, Joan Didion once wrote

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I've been doing some research into notebooks and the like. A friend of mine pointed me towards a Joan Didion essay, "On Keeping A Notebook," that appears in Slouching Towards Bethlehem , a collection of her essays.

Written long ago, in the 1960s I think, the essay is still relevant. In fact, you could make an argument that in the world of blogging and Twitter, it's more relevant than ever.

Reading an arbitrary entry from her notebook, "that woman Estelle is partly the reason why George Sharp and I are separated today," Didion goes on to wonder:

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Why did I write it down? In order to remember, of course, but exactly what was it I wanted to remember? How much of it actually happened? Did any of it? Why do I keep a notebook at all? It is easy to deceive oneself on all those scores. The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in the way that any compulsion tries to justify itself. I suppose that it begins or does not begin in the cradle. Although I have felt compelled to write things down since I was five years old, I doubt that my daughter ever will, for she is a singularly blessed and accepting child, delighted with life exactly as life presents itself to her, unafraid to go to sleep and unafraid to wake up. Keepers of private notebooks are a different breed altogether, lonely and resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children afflicted apparently at birth with some presentiment of loss. [Slouching Towards Bethlehem]

The point of keeping a notebook, then:

So the point of my keeping a notebook has never been, nor is it now, to have an accurate factual record of what I have been doing or thinking. That would be a different impulse entirely, an instinct for reality which I sometimes envy but do not possess. [Slouching Towards Bethlehem]

Recalling her failure to keep a keep a diary she touches on our ability to shape memories while we codify them.

At no point have I ever been able successfully to keep a diary; my approach to daily life ranges from the grossly negligent to the merely absent, and on those few occasions when I have tried dutifully to record a day's events, boredom has so overcome me that the results are mysterious at best… [Slouching Towards Bethlehem]

But if the boredom of daily events doesn't matter, what does?

I sometimes delude myself about why I keep a notebook, imagine that some thrifty virtue derives from preserving everything observed. See enough and write it down, I tell myself, and then some morning when the world seems drained of wonder, some day when I am only going through the motions of doing what I am supposed to do, which is write — on that bankrupt morning I will simply open my notebook and there it will all be, a forgotten account with accumulated interest, paid passage back to the world out there: dialogue overheard in hotels and elevators and at the hat-check counter in Pavillon...

I imagine, in other words, that the notebook is about other people. But of course it is not. I have no real business with what one stranger said to another at the hat-check counter in Pavillon... My stake is always, of course, in the unmentioned girl in the plaid silk dress. Remember what it was to be me: that is always the point. [Slouching Towards Bethlehem]

I think for Didion her notebook was an escape. She was "brought up in the ethic that others, any others, all others, (were) by definition more interesting than (her)." The notebook was an escape.

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[O]ur notebooks give us away, for however dutifully we record what we see around us, the common denominator of all we see is always, transparently, shamelessly, the implacable "I." … [W]e are talking about something private, about bits of the mind's string too short to use, an indiscriminate and erratic assemblage with meaning only for its maker. [Slouching Towards Bethlehem]

In the end the deepest value of notebooks to her was not to remember the line but the memory, "I should remember the woman who said it and the afternoon I heard it." To reconnect with another iteration of herself.

Perhaps it is difficult to see the value in having one's self back in that kind of mood, but I do see it; I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind's door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were. I have already lost touch with a couple of people I used to be; one of them, a seventeen-year-old, presents little threat, although it would be of some interest to me to know again what it feels like to sit on a river levee drinking vodka-and-orange-juice and listening to Les Paul and Mary Ford and their echoes sing "How High the Moon" on the car radio. (You see I still have the scenes, but I no longer perceive myself among those present, no longer could even improvise the dialogue.)

…It is a good idea, then, to keep in touch, and I suppose that keeping in touch is what notebooks are all about. And we are all on our own when it comes to keeping those lines open to ourselves: your notebook will never help me, nor mine you. [Slouching Towards Bethlehem]

Like so much of what I read, I'm new to Didion. Slouching Towards Bethlehem , her first work of non-fiction, is interesting throughout.

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The Notebook

Nicholas sparks, ask litcharts ai: the answer to your questions.

Eighty-year-old Noah Calhoun , who lives in a nursing home in North Carolina, describes the lonely and sometimes painful nature of his final days. Noah knows that he has lived an ordinary life by most people’s standards, but he insists that having known “perfect love” has been enough for him. Noah wanders down the cold halls of the nursing home to visit the room of another patient—a woman—who barely acknowledges him as he sits down beside her, opens up a small notebook , and begins to read to her. Noah is hopeful that today will be the day a miracle happens.

The story flashes back to October of 1946. As dusk falls, Noah sits on the porch of his sprawling home in New Bern, North Carolina. Noah is proud of the work he’s done on the old plantation house—a few weeks ago, a reporter even came to interview him about it and take pictures. Noah is a simple man who spends his days kayaking, reading poetry, and playing guitar with his neighbor Gus . But all the while, Noah pines for a lost love: in 1932, he shared an intense, romantic summer with a young woman named Allie Nelson whose family came to visit New Bern for several months. At the end of the summer, after losing their virginities to each other, Noah and Allie parted ways. Though Noah wrote Allie many letters, she never answered them, and he has not heard from her or seen her since.

The following morning, Allie arrives in New Bern from Raleigh to visit Noah—and to tell him about her engagement to the wealthy lawyer Lon Hammond, Jr. Allie has recently read a newspaper article about Noah’s renovated house and, in the weeks since, has been unable to think of anything else—even though her wedding to Lon is just weeks away. Allie has come to New Bern under the guise of going antiquing. As Allie bathes, dresses, and gathers her courage to head out to visit Noah, the narrative switches back to Noah’s point of view as he reflects on the years since Allie’s departure from New Bern. After heading up north in search of work at the height of the Great Depression, Noah found a job at a scrap yard owned by the kindly Morris Goldman , a man who took a shine to Noah. When Noah returned from fighting in World War II, he found that Morris had left him a significant portion of the company. Noah bought the plantation house and the surrounding land with the funds, and in the 11 months since, he’s dedicated himself day and night to fixing up the property. Lost in thought, Noah finishes his daily tasks, showers, and sits out on the porch. He is surprised when he spots a car coming down the drive—and he is even more shocked when Allie steps out of it.

After standing and staring at each other, Allie and Noah embrace excitedly. Allie tells Noah about having found the article and compliments him on his beautiful handiwork. She apologizes for showing up out of the blue, but Noah assures her that he’s excited to see her. Allie tells Noah about her engagement, and the two of them take a walk down to the river. As Allie tells Noah about Lon, he senses hesitation in her voice. Noah invites Allie to stay for dinner, and she accepts. Allie and Noah continue reminiscing about their summer together as they prepare dinner and tour the house. When Noah asks Allie why she never answered his letters, she becomes confused—she says she never got any letters. Soon, Allie realizes that her mother, Anne , who disapproved of Noah for being of a lower social class, must have confiscated the letters. Noah asks Allie if she thinks they’d still be together if she had gotten the letters, and she admits that she thinks they would be.

Noah then asks Allie about Lon and about her passion for painting , Allie admits that she gave art up despite going to college for it. Noah takes Allie to the living room and shows her that he has hung a painting she gave him long ago over the fireplace—he assures her that she is a true artist and should give painting another shot. Over dinner, Allie realizes that she and Lon never talk as freely as she’s conversing with Noah. After dinner, as Noah reads Allie poetry on the porch, Allie feels a sensual stirring inside of her and thinks that she doesn’t feel this kind of passion for Lon. Overwhelmed, Allie leaves in a hurry. As Noah walks her to her car, he invites her back the following day. Allie accepts his invitation and returns to the inn, unaware that Lon has been trying to call her room all night long.

The next day, as Allie and Noah enjoy their separate mornings, they find themselves lost in thoughts of each other. Noah kayaks as he does every morning, while Allie heads to a department store to purchase some art supplies and make a couple of quick sketches. At noon, Allie drives out to Noah’s, where Noah tells her he is taking her for a surprise. Allie follows Noah down to the river and hops into his canoe. The two set off down the river, again reminiscing about their summer of love as they paddle downstream. When Noah turns off into a small lake, he tells Allie to close her eyes. When she opens them again, she finds that Noah has led them to a secluded cove—they are surrounded by hundreds of swans. After feeding the birds, Allie and Noah notice thunder and lightning approaching. They begin rowing home, but they get trapped in the storm anyway. Allie laughs rapturously as she and Noah are soaked to the bone. Back at the house, Allie and Noah sit in front of the fireplace and sip bourbon as they continue reminiscing about the summer of 1932. When Allie asks Noah if he recalls having sex at the end of the summer, neither of them can resist their feelings any longer. Overcome by passion, the two have sex by the fire. Meanwhile, back in Raleigh, Lon asks for an adjournment in the case he’s working on. He tells the judge he has urgent business to attend to over the weekend, and the judge urges him to be back by Monday at nine. Lon accepts the judge’s mandate and hurries to his car to begin the drive to New Bern.

The next morning, Allie and Noah are in the kitchen when there is a knock at the door. Noah goes to answer it—and he’s shocked to find himself face to face with Allie’s mother, Anne Nelson. Noah welcomes Anne in, and he and Allie sit with her in the living room. Anne tells Allie that she’s noticed her behavior was strange for weeks—and she knew it had to be due to the article about Noah. Anne warns Allie that Lon is on the way—he called the house last night deeply upset, having figured out what Allie was doing in New Bern. Before leaving, Anne gives Allie the letters from Noah and urges her to “follow [her] heart” as she chooses what path her life will take. After Anne leaves, Noah asks Allie what she wants to do. She tells him she is afraid of hurting or upsetting anyone. Noah, however, insists that Allie must do what she wants to do—she must live a life which doesn’t constantly force her to keep looking back and wondering what could have been. Allie begins crying, and Noah tells Allie he already knows she won’t stay. He walks her to her car and helps her inside. He tells her he loves her before she starts the engine, but Allie stoically begins driving away without looking back. Allie continues crying all the way to the inn. When she arrives, she spots Lon’s car in the parking lot. She turns off the engine and reads Noah’s final letter to her, from March of 1935, as she puzzles over what to say to Lon. By the time Allie is finished reading Noah’s last note, she knows exactly what to say, and she heads into the inn with purpose.

The narrative returns to the frame story in the future. Noah finishes reading the notebook and closes it. His female companion—whom readers can now infer is Allie—is comforted by the story and asks if Noah wrote it himself. Noah says that while he didn’t write it, it is a true story. Allie tells Noah that she has a question for him but doesn’t want to hurt his feelings—she asks him, confusedly, who he is. Noah becomes lost in thought as he reflects on the full, beautiful life he and Allie made together. They have four children and many grandchildren, and Allie is a world-famous painter—yet most days, her Alzheimer’s disease prevents her from remembering any of this. Nevertheless, Noah reads to Allie each day in hopes of jogging her memory and enjoying just a few lucid moments with her. Noah spends much of his free time reading old letters and looking at old photographs, reminiscing about the past.

One day, Noah invites Allie on a walk, and she accepts. Together, as they walk the grounds of the nursing home, Allie continues asking questions about the story and inquiring about Noah’s own life. Allie tells Noah that she believes she has a secret admirer—she tells him she often finds notes and poems tucked into her coat pockets or under her pillow. Noah chuckles and leads Allie back up to her room, where the nurses have set out a candlelight dinner for the two of them. The nurses are charmed by Noah’s devotion to Allie and help him woo her every chance they get. As Allie and Noah sit down to dinner and listen to music playing on the stereo, Allie recognizes Noah and tells him she’s always loved him. The two of them enjoy a couple of blissful hours together eating and talking—but soon, Allie begins fading away again. She is suddenly unable to recognize Noah and begins screaming for the nurses, who come down the hall to sedate her and remove Noah from her room.

Noah endures several lonely, foggy days without Allie. One morning, while looking through old letters again, he experiences pain, numbness, and loss of vision—he knows he is having a stroke. After two weeks of being intubated and moving in and out of consciousness, Noah is finally cleared to return to the nursing home. On his first night back, he spends hours losing himself in old letters, photos, and memories before shuffling down the hall toward Allie’s room, having missed her terribly. Though Noah is not supposed to visit Allie after dark, the night nurse, Janice , lets Noah pass. She tells him how much she admires him and how inspired she is by his and Allie’s enduring love. In Allie’s room, Noah sits at the edge of the bed and slips a poem beneath her pillow as she sleeps. He cannot stop himself from caressing her face. Allie wakes and turns to face him. Noah is afraid she won’t recognize him and will begin screaming—but instead, she smiles and addresses him by name, tells him how deeply she’s missed him, and begins undoing the buttons of his shirt.

Joan Didion On Keeping a Notebook

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· Oh, to have kept a page from the past ·

My goodness, I recently immersed myself in Joan Didion’s collection of essays, Slouching Toward Bethlehem . My eye immediately gravitated toward a 1966 essay titled On Keeping a Notebook , subconsciously likely because lately I have been uninspired to keep one myself. Pen to paper, I’d hit a wall, as it’s been hard to dissociate keeping a record of one’s day from what a reporter’s transcript of court proceedings looks like (facts, an exercise in detailed fact-gathering meriting the most overused phrase in the professional world — “detail-oriented” on one’s CV; I want no business in that pomp.)

Didion starts by probing why she writes in a notebook. Sprinkling in examples, a random sauerkrat recipe here, a one-liner heard from a stranger at the Beverly Hills hotel there, she observes the impulsive nature of pen to paper:

“The impulse to write things down is a peculiarly compulsive one, inexplicable to those who do not share it, useful only accidentally, only secondarily, in a way that any compulsion tries to justify itself,” she writes.

Hinting that keepers of private notebooks are not “delighted with life exactly as it presents itself,” she instead views notebook keepers as “resistant rearrangers of things, anxious malcontents, children … with some presentiment of loss.”

She then dismisses the idea that keeping a notebook is a way to preserve an accurate factual record, as her approach to daily life “ranges from the grossly negligent to the merely absent” thanks to the boredom of the day to day.

So, why keep a notebook?

Didion prepares us to take note: “How it felt to me: that is getting closer to the truth about a notebook.”

And then, what follows in the pages of this short essay is an ode to the deeply personal, meaningful only to the maker, reminder that “we are all on our own when it comes to keeping those lines open to ourselves” because “your notebook will never help me, nor mine you.”

What is the point?

“Remember what it was to be me: that is always the point.”

Didion, of course, writes decades before ours, and it is no longer the case, as she had pointed out, that we are taught to see ourselves as the least important person in the room as once was the case (nowadays, in fact, what a different, self-absorbed generation we have).

“Our notebooks give us away, for however dutifully we record what we see around us, the common denominator is always, transparently, shamelessly, the implacable “I.”

Why keep a record of what it was like to be a past version of ourselves? I have “oof yes” annotated in bright blue ink of the following passage, a favorite of mine: “Perhaps it is difficult to see the value in one’s self back in that kind of mood, but I do see it; I think we are well advised to keep on nodding terms with the people we used to be, whether we find them attractive company or not. Otherwise they turn up unannounced and surprise us, come hammering on the mind’s door at 4 a.m. of a bad night and demand to know who deserted them, who betrayed them, who is going to make amends. We forget all too soon the things we thought we could never forget. We forget the loves and the betrayals alike, forget what we whispered and what we screamed, forget who we were.”

As I read this passage, it hit me with a pang that I had forgotten the girl I used to be as a nineteen year-old, how lovingly naive it was for me to sit on the river Seine on a still sunlit summer evening and daydream of finding Love in Paris. How I long to once again know that headstrong girl who was so sure of herself, had already discovered and known herself, but still allowed room for others to recognize her.

The biggest gift Joan Didion thus far gave me through her written word is the comforting thought that “it is a good idea, then, to keep in touch, and . . . keeping in touch is what notebooks are all about.” A deeply personal endeavor. She writes, “We are all on our own when it comes to keeping those lines open to ourselves.”

That Paris summer evening made me feel so in love with the world. And how splendid it would be to have kept a page from that past.

May 15, 2021

The 2006 adaptation of jane eyre, august 7, 2021, related posts, comedy beyond the curtain drop, april 2, 2021.

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How to Start a Writer's Notebook

Last Updated: November 25, 2022

This article was co-authored by Alexander Peterman, MA . Alexander Peterman is a Private Tutor in Florida. He received his MA in Education from the University of Florida in 2017. This article has been viewed 43,641 times.

Whether you use a notebook for journaling, keeping a diary, sketching out short stories or poems, writing essays, or just scribbling down thoughts and observations during the day, it can be helpful to have a place specifically dedicated to writing. If you’d like to write more often than you currently do, having an appealing writer’s notebook can also help motivate you. If you enjoy the notebook itself, you’ll be inclined to crack it open and write, even on a daily basis. To start a writer’s notebook, find a notebook that you like and decide what type of content you want to fill the notebook with.

Finding or Making a Writer’s Notebook

• If you’d like your notebook to be portable (in a shirt pocket or purse), a small notebook may be better. However, if you plan to be prolific and to fill every page with writing, a larger notebook may be more practical.
• If you’re notebook shopping on a budget, size will be the single factor that most determines the price—smaller notebooks, and notebooks with more flimsy covers are usually cheaper.
• If you plan to draw in your notebook, you may also want to find a notebook with graph-paper pages.

• If you write a lot, and don’t want to constantly buy new notebooks, consider buying a three, four, or five subject notebook, so you have ample space to expand.
• Buying multiple notebooks will also be helpful if you want to categorize your writing into multiple subject categories.

• You can also personalize the notebook by writing your name in the front, doodling pictures when you’re bored, or taping in a couple pictures of you and your friends.
• Your personalization doesn’t have to be messy or showy; it just needs to make the journal feel like it’s yours.

• Get pictures, gems, feathers, strings, whatever you want to create your own personal writing place to escape.
• You can also decorate the cover of your writer’s notebook with stickers. You don’t have to do this all at once; build up a collection of stickers over time (through visiting local businesses, for example) and use them to make an appealing collage on your notebook’s cover.

Writing in Your Notebook

• Don’t worry whether or not your writing is “polished.” Just focus on writing something that’s interesting to you and that you can keep coming back to day after day.

• Plan to sit down and write after you get home from school or work.
• Write first thing in the morning before you tackle responsibilities for the day.
• Write in bed at night, before you go to sleep.
• Find a time that works best for you when you are relaxed and undisturbed. This may vary on a day to day basis.

• Give yourself some restrictions when you write to push you out of your comfort zone and try new things.
• Try writing poetry. In poems, you don’t need to have characters or plots; you can write about your feelings or observations of the world around you.
• Read a variety of works for ideas and inspiration. When deciding what to read, plan to focus on different genres so that you can see how well-known writers use descriptive language.

• Always revise your work after you’ve finished a draft, a poem, or an essay. If you don’t like what you’ve written or you think it could be better, add or remove a section, change the genre or style, or change the point of view. [3] X Research source

• You’ll also receive compliments on your writing, which are encouraging and can motivate you to continue writing or to try a new style of writing.
• However, if you would prefer your notebook and its contents to remain private—especially if you’ve written sensitive or personal information inside—that’s fine too. If someone asks to read your notebook, you can just say, “No thank you, I’d prefer that other people not read what I’m writing in my notebook.”
• Keep your notebook in a private spot in your room to prevent others from looking at it.

Generating Ideas for Your Writing

• Write down the details right when you see them. It’s likely you’ll forget what you wanted to write the longer you wait.
• Note things like how a tree looks when it loses its leaves, how fresh baked foods smell, or how you feel at the end of a long day.
• Make notes of what you have seen in the past such as the author/artist and write any description of your inspiration in the start of the book.

• You can also try this by listening to someone’s conversation on the phone. You won’t be able to hear the other side of the conversation, but that is the fun part because you can imagine what the other person is saying and incorporate that into your writing.

• Try taking words you’ve already used in your writing and looking up their synonyms in a thesaurus.
• This will help you to use more descriptive words in your writing, making it more interesting and more detailed. It will also help you to expand your vocabulary.

• If you take your journal with you everywhere you go, you’ll be able to jot down impressions, observations, or phrases that you see or overhear throughout the day.

Community Q&A

• Bring your notebook with you to as many places as possible. Keep your notebook with you at school or work, and keep around the house when you’re at home. Don’t let inspiration strike when you are unprepared! Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• You can also use your notebook for sketching or doodling; don’t feel constrained to only write in the notebook. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0
• However, if you start to become more interested in drawing and less in writing, then you may need to re-invest and purchase a drawing notebook with unlined, high-quality paper. Thanks Helpful 0 Not Helpful 0

You Might Also Like

• ↑ http://www.scholastic.com/teachers/top-teaching/2014/09/setting-writers-notebooks-part-2-inside
• ↑ https://letterpile.com/writing/Inspiration-Journal
• ↑ http://ralphfletcher.com/tips-young-readers/
• ↑ https://sarahbrennanblog.com/top-ten-writing-tips-for-kids/3-start-a-writers-notebook/

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Themes and Analysis

The notebook, by nicholas sparks.

At the core of 'The Notebook' is the relationship between the heart and the mind, feelings, and memories. The themes, symbols and key moments in the novel are discussed here.

Article written by Israel Njoku

Degree in M.C.M with focus on Literature from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

‘ The Notebook ‘ by Nicholas Sparks captures themes and symbols with philosophical and psychological implications, particularly on the issue of the relationship between feelings and memories. It begs the question, how much do our memories shape our feelings? The novel is small in volume but mighty in its ability to provoke thoughts and introspection.

Like books such as ‘ Romeo and Juliet ‘ by William Shakespeare and ‘ Pride and Prejudice ‘ by Jane Austen , the familiar theme of love is found in ‘ The Notebook ‘ by Nicholas Sparks. Also, there are other less popular but important themes, such as aging, memory, beauty in nature, and class discrimination in this novel. Let’s take a close look at some of these themes here.

Enduring Love

In ‘ The Notebook ,’ love is remarked as a force capable of overcoming all odds, be it social class, science, time, age, or physical ailment. Love is a powerful value capable of bringing life and restoring purpose to life regardless of whatever challenges there may be. Noah and Allie fall in love as teenagers, but their nascent love faces many challenges. The first challenge is their separation when Allie moves with her family to a new city. The next challenge is interference from Allie’s parents, then Allie’s betrothal to another man. But Allie and Noah overcome all these challenges to their union and marry each other.

The challenges continue even in their blissful marriage. The death of one of their children and the loss of Allie’s mind are the greatest of these challenges. But it does not deter Noah from nurturing their love, and their union waxes stronger.

Aging and Mortality

A dominant setting in the novel is a nursing home for old people, where we see several inmates, including the protagonists passing through several levels of physical debilitation as a result of their old age. The novel remarks on the inevitable deterioration of the mortal human body with time and that this deterioration must eventually lead to death.

From the perspective of old age, the narrator rues the folly of wasting one’s limited time in life chasing things that will not matter in the long run at the expense of eternal values like love.

‘ The Notebook ‘ by Nicholas Sparks also highlights some of the differences between the mind, body, and behavior of young people and old people.

Memories and Feelings

One of the other ascendant themes of ‘ The Notebook ‘ is the existential argument that feelings are much beyond what the mind can comprehend and that memory is only a peripheral value when juxtaposed with feelings.

This is best explained in the complexities of Allie’s interactions with Noah as she suffers from Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimer’s disease wiped Allie’s mind clean of all her memories, including the memory of her soul mate and lifelong lover, Noah. Yet, she feels a connection with him and feels safe in his company despite her inability to recognize him. Sometimes, the power of Allie’s feelings for Noah defies her disease, and she is able to recall memories of him.

Nicholas Sparks suggests in ‘ The Notebook ‘ that the workings of the human mind are not only controlled by experience and memories but also by feelings.

The Beauty of Nature

‘ The Notebook ‘ celebrates and pays tribute to nature in several ways. From Noah’s appreciation of and description of elements of nature to Allie’s art and paintings, we see a profound picture of the beauty of nature in flowers, the sky, swans, and trees, among others.

The characters Noah and Allie enjoy nature so much that the view of flowers and birds becomes both romantic and therapeutic to both of them.

Class Discrimination

‘ The Notebook ‘ by Nicholas Sparks frowns at the discrimination against people based on social class. In the novel, Allie’s parents try to put an obstacle between Allie and Noah because of their snobbish belief that Noah being from a poor family, is not good enough for their socialite daughter.

Class discrimination made Allie’s parents blind to Noah’s admirable qualities of kindness, hard work, and integrity. This made them stand in the way of their daughter’s happiness.

Analysis of Key Moments

• Noah is an eighty-year-old in a nursing home and goes to visit his wife, Allie, but Allie does not recognize him because she suffers from Alzheimer’s disease.
• Noah begins to read to Allie from a notebook that narrates a story from another timeline.
• Noah is a lonely young man back from the war and spending his fortune and energy refurbishing an old, abandoned house in New Bern, North Carolina.
• Young Allie is three weeks away from getting married to Lon Hammond, but she decides to visit Noah in New Bern before getting married.
• Allie and Noah reconnect and rekindle their love after a few dates together.
• Lon grows suspicious of Allie after she misses numerous calls he placed at the hotel where she is meant to be. He decides to go to New Bern and find out what is going on with her.
• Allie’s mother, Anne Nelson, rushes to New Bern to warn Allie that Lon is coming in search of her. She then gives Allie letters from Noah, which she had hitherto hidden from Allie.
• Allie goes to meet Lon and breaks up with him.
• Noah and Allie get married and have children, but with time Allie begins to suffer from Alzheimer’s disease.
• Noah and Allie both move to a nursing home, and Noah makes it a routine to go and read their love story to Allie every day.

Style, Tone, and Figurative Language

The style of the narration is a combination of the first-person narrative and the third-person narrative. The author also makes use of framing devices in the novel. A framing device is a narrative technique where a story is told amidst another story. Often, the beginning and ending chapters serve as frames for the story told in the chapters in between. As we have in ‘ The Notebook ,’ chapter one and chapter eight frame the story told in chapters two to seven.

The tone of the narrator is poetic and wistful, and there are figurative devices deployed in the narration, notably similes and metaphors.

Analysis of Symbols

Symbols are items that signify something abstract beyond what they are at surface value. Some of the symbols in ‘ The Notebook ‘ are:

Noah’s House

Beyond its practical utility as a shelter, Noah’s house in New Bern is an emblem of his dreams and his belief that dreams eventually come true through hard work, patience, and diligence.

The house is also a symbol of the dead things that can be brought to life by the power of love and attention.

Allie’s Painting

Allie’s painting is a symbol of her desires and ideals. At some point in her life, she lost sight of both values in her life, but the recovery of her art and talent in painting was symbolic of her acceptance of her true self.

The Storm and the Hearth

The Storm in ‘The Notebook ‘ symbolizes the challenges posed to Noah and Allie’s union. On the other hand, the hearth symbolizes a haven that Noah and Allie find with each other that protects them from the cold and dangers of the storm.

The notebook is a symbol of the power of words and stories in preserving memories, feelings, and enriching experiences. Allie, whose memory was failing her because of her disease, could only revive the passions of her past by listening to her story from the notebook.

What mental illness does Allie have in ‘ The Notebook ?’

Allie is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in ‘ The Notebook .’ The disease makes her lose memories of her identity, family, and her past.

What is the age difference between Noah and Allie in ‘ The Notebook ?’

The age difference between Noah and Allie is two years. Noah is two years older than Allie. They first began their relationship when Allie was fifteen years old and Noah seventeen.

Why is ‘ The Notebook ‘ regarded as unrealistic?

‘The Notebook’ by Nicholas Sparks is regarded as unrealistic by many because of the character Noah. Noah is too idealistic and without flaws that make him relatable as a character.

Who is the antagonist of ‘ The Notebook ‘ by Nicholas Sparks?

The antagonist of ‘ The Notebook’ is Allie’s mother, Anne Nelson. She poses as the major obstacle against the protagonists’ love and happiness.

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About Israel Njoku

Israel loves to delve into rigorous analysis of themes with broader implications. As a passionate book lover and reviewer, Israel aims to contribute meaningful insights into broader discussions.

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The Notebook

31 pages • 1 hour read

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Chapter Summaries & Analyses

Chapters 1-3

Chapters 4-10

Chapters 11-12

Character Analysis

Symbols & Motifs

Important Quotes

Essay Topics

Discussion Questions

Summary and Study Guide

The Notebook is a 1996 novel by Nicholas Sparks. The story centers on the relationship between Noah Calhoun and Allie Nelson . Spanning over five decades, their love endures an uncertain beginning, the onset and conclusion of World War II, the death of one child, and Allie’s eventual diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease.

The novel is framed by the titular notebook. The story that the reader engages with is the same one that an elderly Noah reads to Allie in the Creekside Assistance Living Facility when they are in their eighties. Allie does not know who Noah is, only that he comes to her room every day and reads to her. Each night, she forgets who he is and what he has read to her. Noah loves her and enjoys his time with her but also holds out hope that the story will restore her memories and bring her back to him.

The teenage Allie and Noah meet one summer in the 1930s, in the small town of New Bern, North Carolina. They fall in love and promise that they will always be together. But at the end of the summer, Allie leaves with her family, and Noah does not hear from her again for fourteen years. He writes to her every month, but his letters receive no reply. Allie will later learn that Noah wrote to her but that her mother intercepted the letters and hid them. Allie’s family is part of the southern aristocracy, and her parents do not believe that the lower-class Noah deserves their daughter.

After fourteen years, Allie returns to New Bern to tell Noah that she is engaged to a good, charming, handsome attorney named Lon Hammond. But she and Lon do not have a passionate relationship. Allie and Noah quickly fall in love again. Allie’s mother figures out why her daughter is in New Bern and visits them at Noah’s house. She gives Allie the letters she hid and tells her to make whatever decision is best for her. That is where Noah ends his written account of their story and the novel returns to present day.

In the final chapter, Noah reveals the circumstances of Allie’s diagnosis and relates a summary of their life together after she left Lon and came to New Bern to be with him. She has since become a famous painter, and they traveled the world and had five children together, with four surviving.

Allie remembers who Noah is after he finishes reading, and understands that they are the characters in the story from the notebook. But her dementia quickly returns, and she forgets, shouting for help and sending Noah out of her room. Days later, Noah has a stroke that puts him in the hospital for two weeks and paralyses the right side of his body. When he returns to Creekside, he visits Allie on the night of their forty-ninth anniversary. She opens her eyes and calls him by name, then kisses him. As the novel ends, Noah says that they are going to heaven together, at the same moment.

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Home — Essay Samples — Literature — The Notebook — A Review of The Notebook, a 2004 Movie Based on a Novel by Nicholas Sparks

A Review of The Notebook, a 2004 Movie Based on a Novel by Nicholas Sparks

• Categories: The Notebook

About this sample

Words: 515 |

Published: Nov 16, 2018

Words: 515 | Page: 1 | 3 min read

The Notebook

Works cited.

• Sparks, N. (1996). The Notebook. Grand Central Publishing.
• Sparks, N. (1999). A Walk to Remember. Warner Books.
• Sparks, N. (2006). Dear John. Grand Central Publishing.
• Sparks, N. (2013). The Longest Ride. Grand Central Publishing.
• O'Bryan, S. (2013). An analysis of the use of descriptive language in The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science Research, 1(1), 78-89.
• McDaniel, D. (2005). The Notebook: A Film for All Seasons. Film Journal International, 108(3), 16-17.
• Kord, S. (2013). The Novel and the Cinema: Nicholas Sparks’s The Notebook. In A. Blouin, & J. Tsao (Eds.), Adaptation: The Journal of Literature on Screen Studies, 6(2), 177-195.
• Nafisi, A. (2008). The Notebook: An American Classic. The Chronicle of Higher Education, 54(7), B6-B9.
• Smiley, J. (2013). The Appeal of Nicholas Sparks. New York Times, 18.
• Bauer, T. (2016). The Notebook: Why Audiences Fall in Love with Nicholas Sparks's Tragic Love Story. In T. Bauer (Ed.), Unrequited Love in Literature (pp. 127-136). Palgrave Macmillan.

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By Melanie Pinola

Melanie Pinola is a writer focused on home-office gear. To find the best paper shredder, she has shredded enough junk mail to fill several bathtubs.

A notebook is more than just a practical tool. It can be a source of joy, a covetable item that turns an ordinary, everyday task—note-taking, journaling, task-planning, brainstorming, or doodling—into a sublime experience.

Upgrading from a cheap notebook to a high-quality one usually costs just a couple more cents per page (or about $2 to $5 overall), and you’re worth it.

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We mention price per page when it’s notable, but our picks average 7¢ per page (at the time of publication). We also mention paper weight or thickness when that spec is important, but most of these high-quality pages are 80 to 90 grams per square meter (gsm); thicker isn’t always better, but all of the paper in our picks felt substantial and satisfying for us to write on. And most of the notebooks we tested had 7 mm lined ruling (close to college rule), but we note the exceptions below.

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Why you should trust us, a medium softcover notebook with silky pages: apica premium c.d. notebook (a5), a medium softcover notebook with more texture: midori md notebook (a5), a hardcover notebook for journaling or planning: leuchtturm1917 hardcover notebook classic (a5), the best budget hardcover notebook: paperage hardcover lined journal notebook, the best spiral-bound notebook: maruman mnemosyne n194a special memo notebook, disc-bound notebook for maximum customizability: levenger circa notebook, best pocket-size pick: muji passport memo, an upgraded pocket-size notebook: field notes 3-pack original kraft memo books, best reporter notebook: field notes 2-pack front page reporter’s notebooks, the best steno notepad: maruman mnemosyne n166 steno pad (a5), the best legal pad: rhodia no. 19 yellow pad, what about moleskine, how we picked and tested, other good notebooks and notepads, the competition.

Senior staff writer Melanie Pinola has tested and reviewed home office gear for Wirecutter since 2011, including webcams , USB microphones , and office chairs . She’s a die-hard stationery fan who uses notebooks daily for work and personal projects; it’s probably telling that almost everyone close to her has gifted her a notebook at one point or another.

During our preliminary notebook research, we consulted with and relied upon the work of experienced bloggers who review pens, pencils, and stationery, as well as a representative for online stationery store JetPens. These people care far more about the performance of paper against all sorts of writing implements than most people, and they also have a wide range of papers to compare notebooks with.

Apica Premium C.D. Notebook (A5)

The best medium-size softcover notebook.

This notebook is a pleasure to use thanks to its sturdy yet lightweight cardstock cover, excellent paper quality, and lie-flat design. The medium size can serve a wide range of purposes.

Buying Options

Get this if: You want a softcover notebook that is the size of a trade paperback book and has smooth paper your pen will glide over. The notebook’s paper shows off ink colors from fountain and rollerball pens brilliantly.

Why it’s great: Four out of five Wirecutter panelists chose the Apica Premium C.D. Notebook (A5) as their top or second-favorite notebook pick, saying the feel of the paper was the “best out of the bunch” and “silky yet not plasticky like some others.” The thick paper stood up well to a range of writing instruments—even demanding fountain pen ink—with little feathering and minimal ghosting.

We also liked the paper’s off-white, eggshell color—neither too bright nor too yellow—and the light-gray line ruling. The cardstock cover is sturdy, and the stitched binding is high quality, which allows the notebook to lie flat nicely. All in all, this is a great all-purpose notebook.

Flaws but not dealbreakers

• The Premium C.D. Notebook’s super-smooth paper isn’t for everyone, especially those who are expecting a traditional paper feel as you get with typical composition notebooks. It feels more like the slick pages of The New York Times Magazine than the tougher paper that makes up the rest of the newspaper.
• It doesn’t come with a ribbon page marker, and although it has a small index on the first page, the pages aren’t numbered. Those features aren’t essential for most people, but if they matter to you, consider the Leuchtturm1917 Softcover Notebook Classic .

Size: A5 (5.8 by 8.3 inches); 192 pages Ruling options: lined, graph, blank

Midori MD Notebook (A5)

A minimalist notebook with creamy, slightly toothy paper.

Because of its texture, this notebook is especially great for writing, sketching, or doodling with pencils or ballpoint pens, although it holds up to fountain pens too.

Get this if: You want a medium-size notebook with paper that’s easy on the eyes and offers tactile feedback—the slightly toothy paper slows your writing down and makes you pay more attention to it, in contrast to slicker paper that your pen would glide across.

Why it’s great: The Midori MD Notebook is simplicity at its best, with a plain cream-color cardstock cover and matte pages with light blue ruling. Three out of five testers ranked this notebook in their top three, saying they loved the pleasant tone of the paper and the notebook’s minimalist aesthetic, which makes writing and journaling as distraction-free as possible.

It takes all sorts of ink, but it handles pencil especially well because of the paper’s slight tooth; the blank or graph versions of the Midori MD Notebook would be fantastic for doodling or sketching. We noticed some ghosting or show-through on the other side of the page, but we didn’t find it intrusive.

The quality of the stitching is terrific and allows the notebook to lie flat. (Compared with other notebooks of this size, including the Apica Premium C.D. Notebook, the Midori MD Notebook is bound in smaller sections, called signatures—16 signatures versus a more common eight or 12—which makes it sturdier and helps it lie flat more easily.) Unlike many other soft notebooks, this one has a ribbon bookmark—a silky green one that nicely complements the cream pages.

• Our main complaint against this otherwise lovely notebook is the dark horizontal line that runs across the middle of all the pages. While some people might use this line to divide their notes, we found it distracting and unnecessary.
• Although the cardstock feels sturdy, it’s not as rugged or as thick as other notebooks’ covers. (It comes with a thin plastic cover, but we found that more intrusive than useful.) Clear, paper, and leather covers are available at JetPens.
• Although most of our testers didn’t experience a lot of smudging with most writing utensils, our left-handed tester found that this notebook’s paper smudged significantly more with a gel pen than that of other notebooks.

Size: A5 (5.8 by 8.3 inches); 176 pages Ruling options: lined, graph, blank

Leuchtturm1917 Hardcover Notebook Classic (A5)

The best medium-size hardcover notebook.

With page numbers, index pages, two ribbon bookmarks, and sticker labels, this notebook has all the bells and whistles and simply feels a bit more special than competing notebooks.

Get this if: You want a medium-size hardcover notebook that helps you organize and keep track of your thoughts and ideas. All of the tiny details, such as the index pages and labels for archiving, make this notebook gift-worthy, too.

Why it’s great: The Leuchtturm1917 Hardcover Notebook Classic (A5) was the favorite notebook of three of our testers, and they listed many reasons for that. Most of all, the cream-color paper is exquisite, with a powdery, toothy texture unlike that of any of the other notebooks we tested or have used in the past. (In a pile of more than 20 notebooks, this is the one I could most readily pick out if blindfolded.)

The paper took well to pencil, ballpoint, rollerball, gel pen, and fountain pens, with very little smudging and no bleeding. Most of our testers said it just felt good to write on.

We love the firm cover and the ample page count, as well as all the extras this notebook offers: two thick ribbon bookmarks, labels for the spine and title page, page numbers, index pages, and a sturdy back pocket.

• Because its paper is thin, you might notice more ghosting with this notebook than with the other notebooks in this list. However, the ink doesn’t show through as much as it does with a Moleskine notebook —perhaps the most popular brand for notebooks of this size and type.
• The line ruling is narrower than in other notebooks we tested—6 mm versus the typical 7 mm. A difference of a single millimeter might not sound like a lot, but if you have large handwriting, this ruling might be too tight for you. On the other hand, if you prefer to have more lines per page, it could be a bonus.

Size: A5 (5.8 by 8.3 inches); 251 pages Ruling options: lined, dot grid, graph, blank

Budget pick

Paperage Hardcover Lined Journal Notebook

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This simple journal-style notebook offers all the basics and a better writing experience than the more-popular Moleskine notebooks it mimics.

Get this if: You want an inexpensive, basic medium-size notebook with a hard cover but don’t want to sacrifice quality.

Why it’s great: We were pleasantly surprised by this $10 notebook. I compared it side by side with a similar Moleskine notebook, and the Paperage Hardcover Lined Journal Notebook paper was a significant upgrade, consisting of thicker, brighter pages that reliably handled rollerball, gel, and fountain pens with very little smudging or feathering.

Although it’s our budget hardcover notebook pick, it doesn’t skimp on extra details such as a silky ribbon bookmark, a back pocket that also has a secondary slot for cards, and spine and title page labels (although they aren’t as attractive as the Leuchtturm1917 notebook’s labels).

• It has thicker, 100 gsm paper than most of the notebooks we’ve tested. This makes the pages easier to flip and more substantial than competing notebooks, but we were torn about whether the added thickness was actually an improvement. Head of photo and video Michael Hession said it felt a bit “cardboardy.” The Paperage notebook offers a fine experience, but if you’re looking for elegantly thin paper in a hardcover shell, you’re better off with our pick from Leuchtturm1917.
• We also noted that the cover felt a bit cheaper than those of higher-priced notebooks—less soft to the touch and with more ragged edges at the rounded corners. But those are only nitpicky criticisms of an otherwise great notebook.

Size: 5.7 by 8 inches; 160 pages Ruling options: lined, dotted, blank

Maruman Mnemosyne N194A Notebook

A pleasant upgrade from standard school-style notebooks.

This large, versatile notebook has sturdy twin spiral rings, premium paper, and perforated pages.

Get this if: You prefer to write in a notebook with ring binding, which helps the notebook lie flat and makes it quicker to thumb through when you’re trying to find specific notes, as students and frequent meeting-notes takers are wont to do. Perforated pages are a big plus if you want to use the pages elsewhere—or if you often regret what you’ve written.

Why it’s great: The paper in the Maruman Mnemosyne N194A Notebook was one of our favorites, particularly when we were writing with a fountain pen. Its vellum-like smoothness made gel and fountain pen inks shine, with crisp, non-feathery edges. Compared with similar spiral notebooks, the paper is thicker and less smudgy, with very little ghosting and no bleeding.

The notebook’s page ruling and format are unique. Rather than a simple lined ruling, its paper has a large header at the top for date and title and then divides the rest of the page into thirds via darker lines. The format seems designed for more organized note-taking, but we’re ambivalent about the page divisions. We did love the notebook’s consistently effortless page perforation and its durable binding.

The poly cover feels strong and protective, but it’s not for everyone and perhaps not as durable as it looks—senior staff writer Kimber Streams disliked the plastic cover and found that it scratched easily from another spiral-bound notebook.

Size: B5 (6.6 by 9.9 inches); 150 pages Ruling options: lined, dot grid

Levenger Circa Simply Irresistible Sampling Kit

Like a binder but better.

This notebook has high-quality paper and accessories that you can arrange and rearrange for the ultimate in versatility.

Get this if: You want the flexibility of a binder but in a more grown-up, professional notebook format. The Levenger Circa Notebook is more of a system than a notebook, and Levenger’s sampling kit includes junior- and letter-size paper, as well as tab dividers and task pads to try out.

Why it’s great: A disc-bound notebook not only lets you move pages to a different section but also allows you to add pages and accessories of different sizes. That means you can add tab dividers, narrow pages with to-do lists, pouches to hold cards or small supplies, and more.

I’ve used several disc-bound notebooks over the years, including Staples’s Arc and the Martha Stewart–branded notebook system , but the Circa Notebook has the paper that stands up best to rearranging. It’s perfect for taking notes on different projects and then grouping them together in separate sections. The paper is a thick (100 gsm), toothy, matte white stock that takes all sorts of ink well.

Levenger also offers the widest range of accessories and style options for its Circa line—from leather covers to discs (in more than a dozen colors) to punches (to make any paper fit into the Circa Notebook). Page refills are available in all sorts of ruling as well as special formats like agenda planners.

The sampling kit comes with 60 sheets of paper in junior (5.5 by 8.5 inches) and letter (8.5 by 11 inches) sizes, as well as dividers, a task pad, translucent covers, and discs to create two notebooks. That should give you enough of a feel for a disc-bound notebook system without requiring too much investment in it.

• Prices for the paper refills are on the high end of the spectrum, on a par with the cost of Field Notes notebooks. You can expect to spend about 10¢ per page for the junior size or about 12¢ per page for the letter size. A binder with loose-leaf paper would definitely be cheaper but would offer a poorer writing experience.
• The translucent covers that come with the sampling kit aren’t as handsome (in our opinion) as those you’d find on our recommended hardcover notebooks (or even many softcovers), but they add to the customizability of the notebook, since anything you put as the first page will show through as the cover design.

Size: junior (5.5 by 8.5 inches) and letter (8.5 by 11 inches); 120 pages Ruling options: lined, grid, blank

Muji Passport Memo

The best all-purpose notebook to have with you at all times.

With a bargain price, a durable cover, and smooth, sturdy pages, this style is almost a no-brainer for a pocket notebook.

Get this if: You want to carry a small, simple notebook everywhere, for a price that doesn’t inhibit your note-taking.

Why it’s great: The Muji Passport Memo proves that you don’t need to spend a lot of money to get a quality notebook. Its cream-color pages are silky smooth, with no bleeding (unless you use a Sharpie) and not much ghosting to be concerned about.

The stitching is strong—the little notebook held up to multiple folding and unfolding and bending tests—and the thick, coated cardboard cover withstood water spills.

The 48 pages provide just enough to cover a trip, an assignment, or some other use without making you feel like you wasted paper if you don’t completely fill it. The Muji Passport Memo is about half an inch shorter than similar pocket notebooks such as the Field Notes Memo Books and the Clairefontaine Basics Life Unplugged notebooks , which makes it a bit more lightweight and a better fit for more pockets.

• Although the notebook easily lies flat when open, getting it to lie flat closed after you’ve used it is nigh impossible. We wish it had an elastic band to keep it from flopping open at our desk, but that’s a minor annoyance.
• The dot grid is very light—you have to really look for it to see it. Basically, the experience feels like writing in a blank notebook.

Size: 3.5 by 4.9 inches; 48 pages Ruling options: dot

Upgrade pick

Field Notes 3-Pack Original Kraft Memo Books

A more stylish pocket notebook.

This Field Notes book offers a wonderful combination of paper quality, durability, and a range of page and cover choices.

Get this if: You want to carry a small notebook everywhere, and you prefer toothy paper and a range of cover styles to choose from.

Why it’s great: The Field Notes Memo Book is not the cheapest pocket notebook you can buy, nor is it filled with the most luxuriously smooth paper available, but it is the best widely available way to treat yourself to a better writing experience.

Aside from the Muji Passport Memo , our testing and surveys have shown that the Field Notes Memo Book is the best-performing notebook that actually fits in a pocket or bag without feeling like a second wallet. In a previous test with nearly 70 Wirecutter staffers, we found that this notebook feathered and smudged the least—even with heavy inks—and many testers liked the light-brown ruling and cover details.

As with the Muji Passport Memo, the 48-page length of the Field Notes notebook feels like the right amount for covering a three-day conference, documenting a weeklong vacation, planning a novel, scribbling a few weeks’ worth of grocery or to-do lists, or just jotting down a number of random thoughts.

Finally, the Field Notes site offers a great array of versions beyond the basic Original Kraft Memo Book, with some 16 covers and variations in different types of ruling available at the time of publication. Some are simply gorgeous or unusual covers, while others introduce unique features, such as being waterproof and tear-proof .

If you like these kinds of little surprises, and you take to Field Notes’s form and paper, you can sign up for a yearly subscription , which gives you four packs of Field Notes notebooks at a reduced price compared with buying them individually and also nets you a few other freebies.

• Field Notes paper represents a notable upgrade from the notebooks you probably bought for school or most memo or legal pads you might use, but it’s not the best paper in all respects. Many Wirecutter testers preferred other notebooks for their paper feel and ghosting performance.
• The Memo Book costs more on a per-page basis than other notebooks this size.

Size: 3.5 by 5.5 inches; 48 pages Ruling options: ruled, graph, plain

Field Notes 2-Pack Front Page Reporter’s Notebooks

A great handheld pad with a soft cover.

This stylish reporter pad is lightweight and has toothy, thick paper.

Get this if: You’re interested in a notebook this size for taking notes one-handed, fitting it in a large pocket or small bag, and stashing receipts or business cards inside the cover—and you’re willing to splurge on high-quality paper.

Why it’s great: The Field Notes Front Page Reporter’s Notebook has bright white paper with a classic matte feel—great for those who like writing in a notebook that gives a lot of tactile feedback. Using even the wettest, inkiest pen we tested for our guide to pens (the Uni-ball Vision Elite), we had a hard time creating a smudge or bleed-through with this notebook.

The spiral-ring binding and thicker paper (70 pounds or 105 gsm—the thickest of the notebook papers we tested) make page-turning much less of a nuisance than with other reporter notepads we tested. The overlapping cardstock cover keeps the double-ring spirals from catching or getting warped in your pocket or bag. And the pocket on the back cover, though open on one side, can serve as a convenient spot for any scrap you need to hold on to until you get back to your office.

Like other Field Notes notebooks, this reporter pad has a distinctive, charming design that makes you feel like you’re going on an adventure, even when you’re just taking notes at your desk.

• On a per-page basis, this notebook is the priciest we recommend (about 11¢ per page, versus an average of 7¢ per page). If you’re an actual news reporter, scrambling from one interview to the next and then flipping through a day’s worth of notes on deadline, paying this much probably isn’t worth it. Save this notepad for more precious notes you might want to refer to in later years.
• The cover is thin cardstock—not as sturdy as what you get with other notebooks, and more prone to getting bent or frayed. It also makes the notepad flex a bit more when you’re holding it with one hand and writing with the other.
• The partially enclosed back pocket can lure you into thinking it’s a totally enclosed and safe pocket, but cards or notes will fall out at certain angles.

Size: 3.75 by 8 inches; 70 pages Ruling options: lined

Maruman Mnemosyne N166 Steno Pad (A5)

The best top-bound, medium-size notepad.

With thick, smooth, perforated paper, this notepad is a fine companion for note-taking.

Get this if: You want a medium-size notepad that’s easy to flip through to refer back to your notes. Because it’s top-bound, leftie writers should find this notebook easier to use than other notebook formats, too.

Why it’s great: The Maruman Mnemosyne N166 Steno Pad (A5) had the best-quality paper of all the steno notebooks we tested. As with the other Maruman Mnemosyne notebooks we considered, the paper is smooth and thick yet slightly translucent—a little like vellum. Inky pens (rollerball, gel, and fountain pens) glided across it nicely in our tests, and it offers enough tooth to make writing on these pages with a pencil or ballpoint pleasant.

Compared with other steno pads, the N166 proved to be the most elegant in design and construction—though, to be fair, not many notebook makers are still producing steno pads these days. While other steno pads (including our previous pick, the Field Notes Steno Pad ) have dark, distracting lines, the light blue-gray lines of the N166 sit in the background—guidelines rather than dictators for your text. That’s especially important if you don’t intend to use the notebook for its two-column organization. Perforated pages mean you can neatly tear out your notes without jagged edges.

• We couldn’t find much to dislike about this steno pad, but if you prefer toothier paper or one with darker lines, the Field Notes Steno Pad would be a better choice for you. It’s more expensive, though, and it lacks page perforation.
• As with the other Maruman Mnemosyne notebooks, the poly cover and yellow cover page of the N166 Steno Pad might not be to everyone’s taste.

Size: A5 (5.8 by 8.3 inches); 140 pages Ruling options: Gregg ruled

Rhodia No. 19 Yellow Pad

The best legal pad.

This full-size legal pad has excellent, smooth paper with a light yellow color that’s easy on the eyes.

Get this if: You want a high-quality legal pad for taking copious notes on paper that will stand out from piles of white documents.

Why it’s great: The Rhodia No. 19 Yellow Pad has silky smooth, creamy yellow paper with subtle blue lines and a thin, double red margin—a big upgrade from the standard, cheap-feeling, less-attractive legal pads that may immediately come to mind when you think about the category. It takes all sorts of ink well, especially rollerball and fountain pens, and despite its thinness, the paper doesn’t show much ghosting or ink show-through on the back.

Unlike paper on competing legal pads, such as the Mintra Office Legal Pad , pages tear off cleanly from the Rhodia notepad. It has an iconic orange cover as well, which is uncommon for this type of notepad.

Rhodia also sells a number of other staple-bound notepads in different sizes and page colors, including a smaller (6 by 8.25 inches) white version for those who like the paper quality but don’t care for the canary color.

• Most legal pads measure 8.5 by 11 inches—letter-size, despite the name. The Rhodia pad’s A4+ size (8.3 by 11.7 inches) is slightly longer and narrower. This makes neatly stacking the pages along with, say, printed documents, impossible. But on the plus side, you’ll easily find your notes in such a stack.
• The Rhodia pad’s cardboard backing isn’t as sturdy as other legal pads, so writing on the notepad on your lap can be tricky.

Size: A4+ (8.3 by 11.7 inches); 160 pages Ruling options: lined, dot grid

Moleskine is the first name many people think of when they think of a fancy notebook. Most prominent among them are the Moleskine Cahier Journals .

But we compared the Moleskine offerings with the other notebooks we tested, and you can do much better. In a Moleskine journal, the ink from anything that’s wider or wetter than a standard ballpoint spreads quickly into the page, where the edges of your letters will feather, and it shows through strongly on the other side. Fine-tipped gel or rollerball pens can pierce the pages with the tips.

Standard Moleskine notebooks can work if you stick to one style of pen, but they cost more per page than most of our notebook picks—and you usually get to use only one side of each page because writing shows through on the other side so easily.

Most experts we read and consulted agree. “You shouldn’t be buying it,” said Elizabeth Newberry of No Pen Intended . “[T]here are too many other good options on the market that don’t have the ink challenges Moleskine does,” said Brad Dowdy of The Pen Addict .

These challenges include ghosting, feathering, and an utter intolerance for any wet ink, be it gel or fountain. Some stationery blogs go out of their way to suggest Moleskine alternatives . Moleskine offers many varieties, some with higher-quality paper, like the Volant Journals , but often at prices the same as or above those of the notebooks we tested for this guide.

If you just need paper to write on and want to save the most money, use any paper you can find. But if you write every day and need to keep your thoughts organized—especially on a specific project—having a good notebook can be a lifesaver.

The notebooks we tested and picked for this guide are designed to be pleasant to write in, nice to look at, durable, and worth the price for your plans, tasks, thoughts, lists, and reminders. They average about $9 per notebook and 7¢ per page, which is reasonable for something you might rely on daily.

We combed through the favorites of experts and co-workers and searched deep into the inventories of Amazon and JetPens. Sorting and filtering for price, plus the sizes and rulings that people find most useful (grid paper has its place, but most people prefer lined rulings), we narrowed a list of 106 possible contenders down to 34 test candidates.

Over the course of about two weeks, I wrote on several pages in each notebook using a variety of writing utensils: pencils and ballpoint, gel, rollerball, and fountain pens. I took notes about each notebook’s design and construction, as well as the feel of its paper, looking out for issues such as bleeding, ghosting, or feathering. Then I selected 10 notebooks that represented a sampling of each major brand and sent them to four other Wirecutter staffers—all notebook enthusiasts—to test. For a previous version of this guide, a left-handed tester also helped us evaluate the smudginess of each notebook’s paper.

Judging notebooks with similar characteristics is hard, especially when you might like the paper in one but prefer the format of another, such as a steno notebook versus a hardcover journal. To help divorce the paper from its shape and binding, many of our testers cut out pages from each notebook and wrote the same thing—a passage from Kant, a poem, or other famous and well-loved words—to compare the papers side by side.

After writing in each notebook over the course of a week, using the same pen or pencil in each, the testers filled out a survey selecting their top three notebook picks as well as their least favorite. They also provided the reasons for their selections. In (rough) order of importance, we rated the notebooks based on:

• the feel of the paper under pen and pencil
• bleeding (ink passing through to the other side of the paper)
• feathering (ink seeping from the edges of letters)
• ghosting (pen ink visible on the other side of paper)
• pen ink smudging
• look and design, including perceived durability

After the results were in, joyful paper nerding ensued in our Slack channel:

Our picks are based on our panelists’ rankings, expert advice, and my individual testing of other notebooks that I didn’t send to the panel.

Many notebooks we don’t recommend are still great options for the right person. We’ve highlighted reasons you might consider the following notebooks in addition to our picks.

If you need a large, thin notebook to dedicate to a single subject or class: The Apica Notebook CD15 can fit the bill. It has similar high-quality paper as our medium notebook pick, the Apica Premium C.D. Notebook , but in a 7-by-10 inch size. It has just 33 sheets of paper, though, much less than the 80-sheet Maruman Mnemosyne N194A Notebook .

If you’d like a hardcover reporter-style notepad: The Leuchtturm1917 Notepad is the best option. It has the same exquisite toothy and powdery paper as Leuchtturm’s other notepads but in a 3.5-by-6-inch flip-over design. Pages are perforated and numbered too, and it comes with an index page, back pocket, and labels. It’s just not as easy to use when folding the cover back as the Field Notes Front Page Reporter’s Notebook , nor as lightweight.

If you’d like two types of ruling in one notebook: We tested the Code&Quill Compass reporter’s notepad and appreciated its thick (100 gsm) paper, which has a unique ruling: dot grid on one side and indented rule on the other. But we found this hardcover notebook too bulky to write easily on when holding it with one hand. The company offers notebooks in other formats, though, so if the ruling appeals to you—it seems ideal for coders and creative types—take a look at its other offerings.

If you want a small notebook for your to-do lists: The pocket-size Word notebooks have high-quality paper (similar to that of Field Notes) and come in a variety of interesting cover designs, but the pages have bullet point guides, so the format is more suitable for task-planning or bullet-journaling than for general note-taking or other uses.

This is not a comprehensive list of all notebooks and notepads we’ve tested. We have removed models that are discontinued or no longer meet our criteria.

The Black n’ Red Professional Notebook , a previous pick, was our panelists’ least favorite notebook by far this time around. It had the smudgiest paper of the notebooks we tested, and we disliked the overall aesthetic, including its thick gray lines, the cheesy motivational quotes on the divider pages, and the obtrusive black markings in the page corners (which are there so you can scan the pages with the company’s smartphone app to digitize them).

The Field Notes Steno Pad is still a fine notebook, with a sturdy cover and great paper. The Maruman Mnemosyne N166 Steno Pad is a better value, though, costing about 7¢ per page versus the Field Notes pad’s 12¢ per page. The Field Notes steno pad also lacks perforation, and we found its lines to be too heavy in comparison with those of the N166.

The Rhodia Desk Webnotebook wound up as one of our panelists’ least favorite options because of its cheap-feeling cover and pages that felt too slick and waxy. This was a surprising disappointment because we love the paper quality in the company’s notepads.

We dismissed several cheap notebooks that ranged from 2¢ to 3¢ per page—the Blueline Steno Pad , the National Brand Subject Wirebound Notebook , and the National Brand Steno Notes —because their paper was very thin and flimsy. If you just want the cheapest scrap paper, one of these notebooks would be fine. Similarly, the Tops Reporter’s Notebook , which costs 7¢ per page, offers merely mediocre paper that’s no better than what you’d find in a dollar-store notebook.

We also dismissed most legal pads we tested, including the Amazon Basics Wide Ruled Lined Writing Note Pad , the Tops Docket Gold Writing Pad , and the Ampad Gold Fibre Perforated Pad . They’re more or less interchangeable budget notepads.

That’s not to say that there isn’t a place for these notebooks and notepads—they simply weren’t what we were looking for.

This article was edited by Ben Keough and Erica Ogg.

Brad Dowdy, The Pen Addict , email interview, September 2020

Elizabeth Newberry, No Pen Intended , email interview, September 2020

Ian Hedley, Pens! Paper! Pencils! and Pennaquod , email interview, September 2020

Meet your guide

Melanie Pinola

Melanie Pinola covers home office, remote work, and productivity as a senior staff writer at Wirecutter. She has contributed to print and online publications such as The New York Times, Consumer Reports, Lifehacker, and PCWorld, specializing in tech, work, and lifestyle/family topics. She’s thrilled when those topics intersect—and when she gets to write about them in her PJs.

Further reading

I’m Wirecutter’s Resident Notebook Expert. Here’s My Favorite Journal.

by Melanie Pinola

The Leuchtturm1917 Hardcover Notebook Classic is the just-right notebook for this avid journaler.

These Lovely Little Notebooks Help Me Get Ideas Out of My Head (and My Face Out of My Phone)

by Elissa Sanci

The Field Notes Memo Book is my everyday companion.

Why I (Still) Carry a Notebook Everywhere

by Martha McPhee

Novelist Martha McPhee explains why, in this digital age, she finds notebook and pen not only relevant, but necessary.

How a $2 Notebook Helps My Insomnia

by Dorie Chevlen

Sometimes the fanciest remedies won’t work to combat anxiety-induced insomnia. But a $2 notebook helped this writer get back to sleep.

Essay on Computer and its Uses for School Students and Children

500+ words essay on computer.

In this essay on computer, we are going to discuss some useful things about computers. The modern-day computer has become an important part of our daily life. Also, their usage has increased much fold during the last decade. Nowadays, they use the computer in every office whether private or government. Mankind is using computers for over many decades now. Also, they are used in many fields like agriculture, designing, machinery making, defense and many more. Above all, they have revolutionized the whole world.

History of Computers

It is very difficult to find the exact origin of computers. But according to some experts computer exists at the time of world war-II. Also, at that time they were used for keeping data. But, it was for only government use and not for public use. Above all, in the beginning, the computer was a very large and heavy machine.

Working of a Computer 

The computer runs on a three-step cycle namely input, process, and output. Also, the computer follows this cycle in every process it was asked to do. In simple words, the process can be explained in this way. The data which we feed into the computer is input, the work CPU do is process and the result which the computer give is output.

Components and Types of Computer

The simple computer basically consists of CPU, monitor, mouse, and keyboard . Also, there are hundreds of other computer parts that can be attached to it. These other parts include a printer, laser pen, scanner , etc.

The computer is categorized into many different types like supercomputers, mainframes, personal computers (desktop), PDAs, laptop, etc. The mobile phone is also a type of computer because it fulfills all the criteria of being a computer.

Get the huge list of more than 500 Essay Topics and Ideas

Uses of Computer in Various Fields

As the usage of computer increased it became a necessity for almost every field to use computers for their operations. Also, they have made working and sorting things easier. Below we are mentioning some of the important fields that use a computer in their daily operation.

Medical Field

They use computers to diagnose diseases, run tests and for finding the cure for deadly diseases . Also, they are able to find a cure for many diseases because of computers.

Whether it’s scientific research, space research or any social research computers help in all of them. Also, due to them, we are able to keep a check on the environment , space, and society. Space research helped us to explore the galaxies. While scientific research has helped us to locate resources and various other useful resources from the earth.

For any country, his defence is most important for the safety and security of its people. Also, computer in this field helps the country’s security agencies to detect a threat which can be harmful in the future. Above all the defense industry use them to keep surveillance on our enemy.

Threats from a Computer

Computers have become a necessity also, they have become a threat too. This is due to hackers who steal your private data and leak them on internet. Also, anyone can access this data. Apart from that, there are other threats like viruses, spams, bug and many other problems.

The computer is a very important machine that has become a useful part of our life. Also, the computers have twin-faces on one side it’s a boon and on the other side, it’s a bane. Its uses completely depend upon you. Apart from that, a day in the future will come when human civilization won’t be able to survive without computers as we depend on them too much. Till now it is a great discovery of mankind that has helped in saving thousands and millions of lives.

Frequently Asked Questions on Computer

Q.1  What is a computer?

A.1 A computer is an electronic device or machine that makes our work easier. Also, they help us in many ways.

Q.2 Mention various fields where computers are used?

A.2  Computers are majorly used in defense, medicine, and for research purposes.

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Jaguars 2024 training camp notebook: day 11, share this article.

With heavy winds and off-and-on rain stemming from Tropical Storm Debby throughout the morning, the Jaguars moved inside their indoor practice facility at the Miller Electric Center for Day 11 of Jacksonville’s 2024 training camp.

Amid the storm, practice was closed to the public for the second day in a row. With players off Tuesday and the storm expected to pass before they retake the field, the Jaguars plan to host fans when they return to work Wednesday.

With Jacksonville’s preseason opener against Kansas City approaching on Saturday, Jaguars head coach Doug Pederson expressed pleasure about his team’s progress through almost two weeks of training camp.

“Pleased with where we’re headed and the work we’ve got done,” Pederson said before Monday’s practice.

“One of the things with training camp as a coach, you try to provide the competition. We’ve seen a lot of good competition out there. Plus, we’re putting guys in some positions to see what they can do. That’s part of the developmental process, so I’ve been pleased where we’re at right now.”

Find Jaguars Wire’s notes, takeaways and highlights from Day 11 of Jacksonville’s training camp below.

An offer for Jags fans

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• Jaguars Wire was not present for Day 8 of Jacksonville’s 2024 training camp
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Daily passing game tracker

Aug. 5, 2024: Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence during Day 11 of Jacksonville’s 2024 training camp. [Credit: Zach Goodall – Jaguars Wire/USA TODAY SMG]

After about a week of generally high-quality play from Jacksonville’s quarterbacks, the signal-callers fell back to Earth Monday, each throwing one interception in team drills to safety Andre Cisco.

Trevor Lawrence went four-of-seven in 11-on-11, with an eighth passing attempt on a deep target to wide receiver Christian Kirk blown dead before the quarterback released the throw. While Lawrence did not complete a touchdown in 11-on-11, he found Kirk for a score in seven-on-seven.

Lawrence’s best pass of the day came from backed up near or in the end zone. He backpedaled to roll left and threw a deep pass across his body to receiver Devin Duvernay down the left sideline for a big gain.

Lawrence likely did not see Cisco in underneath coverage when the safety picked him off later in practice as he attempted a powerful pass of intermediate length to Gabe Davis. All Cisco had to do was raise his hands, and the interception was his.

A dustup notably broke out following a Lawrence-Davis completion during team drills. Cornerback Montaric Brown leveled Davis after the catch, prompting Kirk, who was on the sideline, to rush over and tackle Brown in defense of his teammate. Other players were quick to surround the conflict and break it up.

Mac Jones went zero-of-two and was would-be-sacked twice in 11-on-11, and C.J. Beathard went four-of-five. Jones made an errant pass under duress that went directly to Cisco; Cisco made an athletic play to snatch Beathard’s throw to tight end Brenton Strange.

#Jaguars rookie WR Brian Thomas Jr. getting some pointers from Doug Pederson on Day 11 of training camp. pic.twitter.com/rpvQhbnKn0 — Zach Goodall (@zach_goodall) August 5, 2024

Hot and cold

Jacksonville Jaguars safety Andre Cisco (5) looks on during the ninth day of an NFL football training camp practice Saturday, Aug. 3, 2024 at EverBank Stadium in Jacksonville, Fla. Today marked the first day of public practice inside the stadium.

S Andre Cisco : Cisco’s three interceptions Monday were the most by any player in a single practice so far in camp. He was in a great position to catch two of the picks, without having to move anything but his hands up to haul in the pass from Lawrence, and made a ball-hawking effort to take Beathard’s toss to Strange.

RB Gary Brightwell : A Saturday free-agent signing, Brightwell has not been overly involved in team drills during his first two practices with the Jaguars but made his presence known when he had a passing game opportunity Monday. He made a leaping, contested catch over linebacker Caleb Johnson that drew praise from his new teammates on the sideline.

CB Montaric Brown : Brown was trying to make a play when he laid Davis out. But while the Jaguars sported pads on Monday, the practice was not live and players were not supposed to be tackled to the ground. It was excessive and probably does not help Brown’s case as he competes for a spot at cornerback, where he has faced an intense battle for a depth role.

The quarterbacks : No passer had thrown an interception in team drills since Day 4, until today. The Jaguars’ quarterback room was on fire for over a week but cooled off quite a bit today.

Jaguars injury updates

Jun 13, 2023; Jacksonville, Florida, USA; Jacksonville Jaguars linebacker De’Shaan Dixon (47) participates in mandatory mini camp at TIAA Bank field. Mandatory Credit: Nathan Ray Seebeck-USA TODAY Sports

Practice halted briefly when Jaguars defensive end De’Shaan Dixon went down with an injury on Monday. One could hear a pin drop inside the facility after the team turned off its workout music and players took a knee, until trainers helped Dixon off the field and drills resumed.

Dixon experienced a knee injury, the Jaguars shared after practice.

Find the rest of Jacksonville’s unofficial Day 11 injury report below.

Out : Tight end Patrick Murtagh (ankle), offensive lineman Anton Harrison (concussion protocol), offensive lineman Ezra Cleveland (leg), rookie offensive lineman Steven Jones (calf), cornerback Greg Junior (knee) and safety Andrew Wingard (knee).

Limited : Running back Keilan Robinson (toe), offensive lineman Cam Robinson (shoulder), offensive lineman Cooper Hodges (back), defensive lineman Jordan Jefferson (ankle) and linebacker Ventrell Miller (hand, no-contact).

Safety Darnell Savage (shoulder) continued participating in team and position drills while sporting a no-contact jersey Monday.

Defensive lineman Arik Armstead (knee, on active/physically unable to perform list ) and undrafted rookie wide receiver David White Jr. (knee, injured reserve) remained out Wednesday as they have been since Day 1.

Jaguars Wire's clip of the day

July 20, 2024: Jaguars quarterback Trevor Lawrence (16) and wide receiver Gabe Davis (0) on Day 6 of Jacksonville’s 2024 training camp. [Credit: Zach Goodall – Jaguars Wire/USA TODAY SMG]

Jaguars Wire’s clip of the day features wide receiver Gabe Davis catching a pass from Lawrence on a slant, a route Davis highlighted after practice while speaking with reporters.

“We’re continuing to work, continuing to keep trying to build that chemistry each and every day,” Davis said about his growing chemistry with Lawrence after practice.

“I feel like we’ve got our slants down pat. He kind of hits me where I want it every single time and our slim routes are real successful. Other than that, we just keep going and keep trying to get on the same page.”

Didn’t get many clips today, but here is Trevor Lawrence and Gabe Davis on-air. “I feel like we’ve got our slants down pat,” Davis said in the context of his chemistry with Lawrence after practice. #Jaguars pic.twitter.com/NnUPyKny2t — Zach Goodall (@zach_goodall) August 5, 2024

Jaguars' 2024 training camp schedule

July 29, 2024: The Jacksonville Jaguars huddle during Day 5 of their 2024 training camp. [Credit: Zach Goodall – Jaguars Wire/USA TODAY SMG]

Reserve tickets and find other information about attending Jaguars’ training camp here .

Wednesday, August 7

Thursday, August 8

Monday, August 12 – Gates open at 11:45 a.m.

Wednesday, August 14 – Gates open at 9 a.m./Joint practice with Tampa Bay Buccaneers

Thursday, August 15 – Gates open at 9 a.m./Joint practice with Tampa Bay Buccaneers

*closed to public

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Washington Commanders Notebook: 3 Linemen Missing from Training Camp Practice No. 9

David harrison | aug 4, 2024.

• Washington Commanders

ASHBURN, Va. -- The Washington Commanders had a walkthrough and meetings that were closed to media on Saturday meaning our next chance to see the team in action came Sunday with open practice No. 9.

After simulating game-like scenarios including time management challenges and other items Commanders coach Dan Quinn came into the day's practice motivated and encouraged by what he's seen thus far.

However, he also came into it with three important members of the Washington roster missing in action.

READ MORE: ESPN Analyst Predicts Huge Rookie Season From Commanders’ QB Jayden Daniels

TOEING THE LINE

Beginning the day the Commanders opened practice without offensive lineman Sam Cosmi and defensive linemen Dante Fowler Jr. and Johnny Newton.

Cosmi and Fowler were absent without full explanation from the team as they're not required to disclose those items this time of year, but coach Quinn did say they were taking a cautious approach with Newton, the rookie defensive tackle.

Specifically, Newton will be 'ramped up' and then 'ramped down' as camp progresses to ensure he's getting developed, but also getting opportunities for his body to continue healing after undergoing a second foot surgery in this calendar year alone.

The Commanders did add defensive tackle Taylor Stallworth Sunday morning to the roster giving them more flexibility in how they manage practice reps throughout camp.

Unfortunately, Washington may have also lost offensive tackle Alex Akingbulu who left the practice field on a cart during practice.

EYE ON THE TIGER: DAY 9

Day 9 was a day for the Commanders offense to work on some quick game, motion, screens, and to install more of their rushing attack.

Daniels completed 75 percent of his 11-on-11 passes on the day and looked decisive, smart with the ball, and accurate as ever.

It was also his third straight day of taking all of the first team reps in the drills which gives us the unconfirmed impression the day Daniels is officially named the team's starter could be growing closer by the snap.

Daniels said in his post-practice press conference he's in no hurry to be named the starter and still believes there's plenty of things he needs to work on before concerning himself with titles and the order of the depth chart.

In fact, when asked about potentially starting his first NFL preseason game, he pushed back on the notion saying he hadn't been told that he'd start and was just looking forward to competing, whenever the time comes.

PLAY OF THE DAY

Every play of the day is built differently and this one was selected not because of the explosiveness of it, but because of the way it illustrates this team's culture.

On one of his last team reps of the day Daniels took a quarterback sweep around the left side and ran down to the end zone to celebrate a rushing score with fans in attendance and his teammates.

Rookie offensive tackle Brandon Coleman followed him down and celebrated with his quarterback, and then on the way back veteran linebacker Bobby Wagner met Daniels likely to tell him that his defensive unit would have stopped him well short of the end zone.

It was a fun moment, and one that brought veteran, rookie, offense, and defense together to show that even on Day 9 this version of the Commanders are all working together, and they may even be enjoying it.

READ MORE: Washington Commanders Coach 'Glad' Dorance Armstrong Jr. is Not With Cowboys Anymore

Stick with  CommanderGameday  and the  Locked On Commanders  podcast for more FREE coverage of the Washington Commanders throughout the 2024 season.

More Washington Commanders News

• Washington Commanders Coach Praises 'Consistent' Rookie CB

• Washington Commanders QB Jayden Daniels Status Revealed vs. New York Jets

• Washington Commanders Adding Free Agent Defensive Tackle, Release Cornerback

• Pro Football Hall of Fame Inductee Honors Washington Legend Brian Mitchell

DAVID HARRISON

David Harrison has covered the NFL since 2015 as a digital content creator in both written and audio media. He is the host of Locked On Commanders and a graduate of the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism at Arizona State University. His previous career was as a Military Working Dog Handler for the United States Army. Contact David via email at [email protected] or on Twitter @DHarrison82.

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