Word.ws English Dictionary

putting pen to paper

putting pen to paper is the present participle of put pen to paper.

Meaning of put pen to paper

Verb

put pen to paper (third-person singular simple present puts pen to paper, present participle putting pen to paper, simple past and past participle put pen to paper)

  1. (idiomatic, intransitive) To write something (especially using pen and ink).
  2. (idiomatic, intransitive) To begin to write something.
    • "The Government's response indicates there is still some way to go before they will be ready to put pen to paper on a detailed plan."2023 June 28, “Network News: Government challenged over inertia on decarbonisation”, in RAIL, number 986, page 19

Questions about putting pen to paper

What is putting pen to paper the present participle of?
Putting pen to paper is the present participle of put pen to paper.

Words near putting pen to paper in the dictionary

  1. putting out to pasture
  2. putting out to sea
  3. putting over
  4. putting paid to
  5. putting past
  6. putting pen to paper
  7. putting round
  8. putting salt on someone's tail
  9. putting some timber on
  10. putting someone hip
  11. putting someone in a box

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: putting pen to paper (page history and authors); put pen to paper (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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