Prose Night at The Writing Life, 12 January 2025
Sort of a book review, sort of a reflection on living an analog life.
Ironically, it all began with a Facebook post.
There’s more than a few of my writing friends I connect with online, either over email or social media. It was one of them who posted a link for a book by Scott Scheper, an author from San Diego who had written a book about a misunderstood note-taking system. I misunderstood it because I’d never heard of it until then. However, I’m always looking for ways to be creative and to be helpful with my writing.
So it was on this slender premise I ordered Antinet Zettelkasten by Scheper, and I’ve spent a couple of months pouring through its pages. Is it a well-written book? Yes. Is it a challenging book to read? Absolutely yes. Is it a book and subject of interest for most people? If you are not a writer or researcher, absolutely not, but maybe if you are. Even if I don’t try to experiment with a Antinet in real life (and it looks like I might), it still got me thinking about how both I and others learn and process information.
A Summary (Zettelkasten-WHAT?)
In the book, Scheper traces the creation of this Zettelkasten (German for “Notebox”) by various writers and academics and its refinement into its current form by the German sociologist and writer Niklas Luhmann (1927-1998). Luhmann, who was a social science philosopher and developer of systems theory, ended up producing around 600 academic papers and seventy books during his life.
He was almost more known for building up a zettelkasten of more than 90,000 cards filled with information gleamed from his readings and research. These included index, bibliographic, and data cards, all tucked away into noteboxes until he needed to review them for a spark of insight or obscure information. Luhmann laid out a simple numeric-alpha system of organization allowing for branching off into new and unknown territories.
Scheper has a tall task ahead of him with the book’s subject. Not only does he have to give the needed background to understand the history of the system, he has to explain how the system works with enough detail for his readers to replicate it for themselves, as well as get into the science and reasoning for why writers and researchers might want to use the Zettelkasten, which he terms an Antinet in reference to the analog nature of the system and its nature as a network of ideas. To his credit, I believe Scheper realizes this and tries to prepare his readers for the experience.
The Book
For one of the first times in my reading experience, I read an author admitting in print his book would not be to everyone’s interest. If you have no interest in writing and research, he said not to waste your time. If you are someone thinking the Antinet system will be an easy way to produce a lot of writing, Scheper disabuses you of this thought. Antinet is not for the faint of heart. And that’s just in Chapter Two.
I think the book (which Scheper warns is not an easy read way back in the preface) accomplishes what the author’s goals were for the book.
He gives an interesting overview of Luhmann’s life and how he came to develop and refine the Zettelkasten system over time, and also explained why Luhmann’s work isn’t as well known as it is in Europe (his books are really dense reads, he kind of wanted to be obscure, he has something of a trolling personality, he was German).
He lays out the ins and outs of the Antinet, which covers not only the structure of the system, but how it promotes thought and reasoning.
He spends a considerable amount of time discussing other systems that claim to be a Zettlekasten system, but misunderstand or misinterpret what the system truly was. Some of these misunderstandings involve the Antinet’s nature as an analog system, or the way it is organized (with alpha-numeric designations rather than, say, keywords and tags. Digitization makes things easy to do but hard to memorize.
He does a very good job of explaining how to set up an Antinet yourself, including how to take the notes, organize them, and make use of index and bibliographical cards as well.
The Antinet System
It would take me at least two whole other blogs to totally explain the Antinet system more than what I have here. However, I’ll review some of the vital elements of this system according to Scheper.
It has to be an analog system - that is, a system based on paper and pen/pencil, not electric impulses and programs. Using physical items, things we can see and feel, are important to retaining and expanding knowledge.
It uses an numeric-alpha system of organizing and identifying information. It allows for linking ideas.
It has a tree-like structure where ideas branch off into other ideas in a way that’s not dynamic or fluid, but not one of order, either. It’s kind of like a tree, and like life, as well.
It has an index that serves as a map guiding you to where all the information you have can be found.
Analog, Numeric, Tree, Index - Anti. And since it’s a learning network, you add the “net” on the end, get it?
Thoughts on Analog Thought
Throughout the book, Scheper discusses the importance of the physical process of writing things like notes is on the ability to learn, retain, and process information. He cites many different studies attesting to the scientific basis and support for this belief.
I would second this notion. Over the past forty years, I have been very willing to adopt to the latest technology. I was all in favor of the desktop and then the laptop computer taking over for the typewriter, the hard drive taking over for the notebook and filing cabinet, and Internet sources such as Wikipedia taking the place of the encyclopedias that used to line my parents’ basement bookcases.
However, in recent times, I’ve begun to become a bit distrustful of online platforms that change their terms of service at a whim or whose owners seem to not be good people. Every time I seem to open up my online messages, I get spammed with people who either want to sell me something, be my friend, or want to be my friend and sell me something. Authors are always getting hit up by people wanting to promote their books or do other things for them. At this point, I’m about to make a hard and fast rule not to trust any vendor without getting a recommendation from an IRL friend. There’s no sense in wasting my money on ridiculousness.
From my own experiences in note-taking and other things, the idea of analog thinking and hard work sounds like a good idea. However, I know it’s not for everyone.
For the past several years, I have been a special education teacher. I know it would benefit these students if they were able to take great notes and work hard at getting it done, but I know it’s not as easy as just saying it. Many of these students have difficulty processing information and writing it down at the same time. Many past students, frankly, have an aversion to reading a large amount of written material, or writing. Why should it be a surprise to anyone? If you find something to be incredibly difficult, how motivated would you to be doing it just for the heck of it and not for a grade? They require additional accommodations, and much of the existing technology is a big help for them. Of course, being able to write notes on their own would be a massive benefit, but that’s not where these students are.
I’m grateful for the opportunity to teach special education for several reasons, but one of them is this experience has returned my love of reading and writing to a pure place. When I first started teaching students in language arts fifteen years ago, I had hoped I could pass along my love of reading and writing to them. I came to realize what I loved was not the same as what most children loved growing up. (Thank goodness with my own children I never forced my own hobbies on to them and accepted their interests for what they were. I’m glad I did.)
When I became a special education teacher, I saw firsthand the struggles many students had with the activities I always did just for fun. I realized I would have to meet them at their level, and do what I could to assist them and help them on their learning journey. That has been incredibly rewarding, and as a result my passion for writing has become more my own, something more personal. If a student loves to write, fantastic, and I’ve encouraged many such students. But every individual is different, and I appreciate those differences so much more through my experiences.
So, is working analog a good idea? It might be for me. As for others… they need to do what they need to do for themselves.
Final Verdict:
If you are a writer and/or researcher who’s not afraid of a long and hard mental process and want to try it out in real life, this is definitely worth a read. If that doesn’t apply to you, Scheper admits you shouldn’t waste your time with his book. I would agree, and I will also need to read through Antinet Zettelkasten more than a few times to get my head around all the concepts it lays out. Who knows, I might be filling out some three by five cards soon.
Obligatory Panhandling (lol)
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