Picture a man standing bolt upright--the very image of independence, separateness. In Figure 1, look at line AD-it is straight. When one writes in such a fashion more or less consistently, we say that his writing is vertical. In line AE, however, we have a picture of a man reaching out to speak with someone, as though he were trying to meet the other person part way. In line AF, we see the same as line AE, only more so. Now there is almost desperation in his urge to communicate with the other party, his need for other people. AF is quite a dependent person, all but leaning on the other man for support. In line AC, on the other hand, we see someone withdrawing from communication, cooling off, a certain amount of rebellion present.

And in line AB, we see a kind of super AC, strongly defiant, a person who wants and demands to be alone. AC leans so far away from the other person that he is nearly falling on his back. The slant of writing is one of the most basic and important points in graphology. When you write, your intention is simple-to tell the other person what is on your mind, to communicate. When your approach is "cool," your head (as opposed to your heart) is in control. The vertical writer may indeed have intense emotions, but they are held in check. When writing leans to the right, we call it inclined writing. The inclined writer moves toward the party he is dealing with. The wider the degree of inclination, the stronger the urge to communicate and the stronger the feelings in general. When the writing angle is so forward that it moves into the area marked "acute," we see a person whose emotions are almost out of control, the sensitive one who blows up at the least little thing. His line of reasoning is quite off at times, for he is too emotional to evaluate situations properly. Often he becomes jealous, sentimental, and moody, and may be in desperate need of help. His warmth makes him a likable person, but his temper can easily rage. He is also a very romantic individual. Writing with a leftward angle of inclination is called reclined writing (or sometimes backhand). Left-hand writing (by which graphologists do not mean something written with the left hand but an angle of writing that pulls toward the left) is caused by a situation in the writer's childhood-usually a relationship with his mother. The left-hand side in writing represents the past, and the fact that a man still writes with a leftward reclination show that, in one way or another, he has not grown. It may be something slight (and a slight reclination), or it may have been a very powerful experience. But whatever it was, it stunted his growth to some degree, and he now withdraws, is cool. The idea that the writer's life history may also be the history of his left-slanted writing is not purely conjectural. In the interpretation of handwriting, the left direction quite generally has been interpreted as the direction toward the past, the mother, and oneself. If a writer chooses a left slant and maintains it in spite of its difficulties, then the story of his past, his childhood, and his relation to his mother, may tell us why. It has been my experience that writers with a left slanted hand profess a very tender feeling for their mothers. When the writer leans into the leftward area of "acute," he is detached from society, or on his way there. This angle of writing demonstrates coldness toward others, but the coldness is actually what the writer feels within himself. He is really reverting to the womb for protection, for reassurance, for warmth. He is introverted, drawn back into himself, and thus is in retreat from the rest of the world. It is extremely difficult to get through to the acutely left-handed writer, for he does not readily open up. He is usually quite emotional but his emotions rarely show. To some extent this is true of all left-handed writers. AC, in general, has the emotions of AE, and AB the emotions of AF (or of someone midway between AE and AF), but unlike the inclined writers, who let their emotions out, reclined writers hold them back. It is interesting to note that people who write with their left hand rarely write reclined, but there is a certain tendency among them to write a more vertical hand than their right-handed counterparts. Notice the handwriting samples of the ambidextrous M. K. Gandhi: Figure 2A is written with his right hand; Figure 2B, with his left. The writing with his right hand slants to the right, whereas the writing with the left is vertical. Although a graphologist cannot with absolute certainty determine whether a particular writer is left-handed or right-handed (in the normal sense), there are hints. For instance, in the majority of cases, when a right-handed writer crosses the t bar, the left side of the bar will be thicker and the right side thinner (Figure 3). The writer's mind is on the next word, so he quickly eases up on the pressure and races on, and this is true of the left-handed writer as well. But the latter usually crosses the t bar from right to left, so the right side of the t bar will be thicker and the left side thinner (Figure 4).

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