If your definition of a fine writing instrument is a plastic ballpoint with a smiling tooth and your dentist’s address printed along its side, then a visit to the Fountain Pen Hospital in Lower Manhattan might be revelatory.

In its quiet interior, away from the bustle of Broadway, you can browse and try any of the thousands of fountain, rollerball or high-end ballpoint pens behind its glass cases. That includes a classic fountain pen like the $935 Montblanc Meisterstück, with an elegant gold nib and a piston ink filler inside its black barrel. Or collector bait like the special-edition Krone, which, at $3,920, features a portrait of Benjamin Franklin and, in its cap, a piece of one of his lightning rods.

Or you can try the $55 Parker IM that writes so fluidly and precisely it seems capable of elevating not just your penmanship but also the thoughts you put on the page.