All of us writers owe a delightfully absurd debt of gratitude to sheep. In the days before paper, the dimensions of our writing surface were determined by the circumference of a sheep’s underbelly. This soft skin would be stretched, scudded, and prepared to receive a writer’s quill or a printer’s type. To this day, the dimensions of this vellum still live on in a normal broadsheet newspaper, which could wrap around a sheep from spine-to-spine. Over the years, we folded broadsheets into folios, quartos, A4’s, A5’s, A6’s, and so on, multiplying the number of pages and dividing the amount of space to write upon exponentially.
No matter which notebook you carry around in your book bag or your back pocket, each inherited its width and height from this original, pastoral constraint. Oddly enough, our notebooks hold a certain amount of words, because a sheep’s stomach could hold a certain amount of grass.
With all the various formats available to us today, I often wonder: which notebook fits a certain kind of writing? Does the size of paper we choose affect the kind of writing—the kind of thinking—we do? What is the difference between scribbling an idea on a bar napkin or on a yellow legal pad? When it comes to notebooks, is there a relationship between the medium and the message?
Yes. Different dimensions of notebooks bring out different dimensions of our ideas. When it comes to choosing a notebook, I found there are two paths to consider:
On the one hand, you can approach things from the writing itself—where certain kinds of writing require certain kinds of notebooks. On the other hand, you can approach things from the notebook itself—where writing is flexible, growing or shrinking according to the size the notebook we give it. In other words, there’s a Goldilocks Principle and a Goldfish Principle.
Today, let’s explore the Goldilocks principle: what notebook will fit our writing?
The Goldilocks Principle: Finding the Right Fit
Like Goldilocks sampling beds and chairs, we discover that some notebooks are too small for our ideas, others too large, and a precious few are just right. Below are a breakdown of roughly how many words can fit on a page and what kind of writing suits each book, from my experience.
The King of Capture: A6 (Pocket): 3.5 × 5.5 inches 6 words per line × 16 writable lines = ~96 words per page
The pocket notebook is for capturing things. It can be your Catch-All (⨁), your Reading Log (◫), or your To-Do List (✗). It’s perfect for jotting down the sudden insight on a crowded street, the nagging task you’ll need to do later on, the fleeting observation that might otherwise dissolve into the ether of forgetting. Within a book this size, ideas are easily caught and easily processed.
Its constraint is its gift. There simply is no room to expand on things. (Unless you turn it sideways.) The pocket notebook forces you to distill, to find the seed of the idea before it slips through your fingers. Then you can develop it later on. I always have one of these in my pocket.
Perfect for Poets: Traveler’s Notebook: 4.3 × 8.2 inches ~7 words per line × 20 writable lines = ~140 words per page
The traveler’s notebook occupies that curious middle ground—neither pocket-sized nor quite A5. Personally, I’ve never been a fan of its elongated proportions; the height of the page makes me want to explore things, but the width cuts off my lines before I can fully articulate an idea. Maybe it works better for poetry than it does for prose. The narrow width keeps things within the natural breadth of a phrase, while the height still allows stanzas to stack on the page. If I wrote more poems or song lyrics, maybe it would be exactly the right size for me.
The Standard: A5: 5.5 × 8 inches ~8 words per line × 20 writable lines = ~160 words per page
The A5 is where vignettes begin to bloom. Here is space enough for an idea to stretch its legs and explore, but not so much that it loses its way. The proportions invite a certain kind of contemplation—not rushed, not sprawling, but measured. Whereas a pocket notebook can be a jumbled collection of impressions, there’s an intimacy and personality to the A5. Within this format, both the idea and the writer can finally express who they really are. This is where most of my writing feels most natural.
That being said, I usually use this size for my Planners (⊞). While I use my other sizes for other things, I have to admit A5 is the one I would chose for a desert island. This is the Goldilocks size for me—not too small, not too big, it’s just write.
For Journaling Journeys: B5: 7.2 × 10 inches ~10 words per line × 22 writable lines = ~220 words per page
The B5 opens things up, gives me breathing room. Here, ideas are allowed to breathe and explore further implications. There is room here for digression, for the mind to wander down promising paths, for thoughts to branch and connect in ways that smaller formats constrain. The B5 is generous without being overwhelming. Whereas A5 is great for articulation of an idea, B5 is where most of my ideas are discovered.
This is my favorite size for Morning Pages or Journals (≈).
The Draftsman: Legal Pad: 8.5 × 12 inches ~12 words per line × 27 writable lines = ~324 words per page
Finally, we arrive at that long, yellow rectangle which transforms thinking into something linear and purposeful. I remember hearing a screenwriter saying that this is the ideal size for outlining a feature film. While this essentially shares the same dimensions as loose leaf printer paper, the added ruling helps me structure my arguments and sequence the movements of a composition.
This is ideal for drafting. The extra room allows me to cross out sentences and still see the whole idea develop; I place notes and comments in the margins; I tear out and crumble up pages that are no longer needed. It’s got enough room not to only develop, but to iterate: both composition and decomposition happen on the same page.
Lately, I’ve been drafting all my longer blog posts for the Read Like Lonergan Series, The Pieper Leisure Series, and Alexander’s aesthetics of life. I love tearing them out, marking them up, and throwing them away once they’re published (≡).
The Art of Outgrowing Containers
According to the Goldilocks Principle, we allow our writing to determine which notebook is the best fit. This marriage of content and container, allow each format to reveal what it does best.
Again, if you’re a poet a Traveler’s Notebook might be the good fit. If you’re a novelist or someone who wants to publish their work, you should get a stack of legal pads. When you want to journal, grab a B5. When you want to go for a walk, tuck a A6 notebook in your pocket. If you have to chose only one, get a trusty A5.
We need different formats, because sometimes our writing outgrows its container. A thought captured in the pocket notebook will, if it has life in it, begin to push against those narrow margins. That restlessness becomes a signal: maybe I’ll expand that thought in an A5; maybe it wants to run wild in a B5; maybe it seeks the linear discipline of a legal pad. Ideas are alive, and each size might be just right as they grow.
But what happens when we flip this relationship? What if we don’t start with the idea, but with the notebook itself? What if the format we choose actually shapes the thoughts we think?
That’s where the Goldfish Principle comes in—and it’s a story worth exploring in our next installment.
Next: Part 2 explores the Goldfish Principle—how our writing adapts to fill whatever container we give it, for better and worse.
Until then, here’s a post about my 3-to-5 most frequently used notebooks:
My Life in Three-to-Five Notebooks: Armchair Method
One shelf in my office is full of books I wrote. While I’ve never actually published a book, that’s not to say I haven’t written dozens of them over the years. In a way, it seems I actually wrote only one book that stretches out across the decades, like Proust’s