Why are bodies of pencils either round, hexagonal or curvy-triangular?
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To make them easier to hold.
You can actually get round pencils too, but they tend to slide around in your hand.
The angles of the hexagonal or triangular pencils fit well in a traditional hand grip for a pencil.
The standard pencil grip involves the thumb and two fingers. For a comfortable grip, the object should be perpendicular to the user’s digits at each point.
This can be achieved with a circle, triangle, or hexagon (or any further multiple of 3, but getting to 9 and 12 at that scale, it becomes easier to just go with circular).
Using a different shape, e.g. a square, would result in at least one of the user’s digits being directly on a corner, instead of a flat side.
Carpenters pencil is flat so it doesnt roll away when set down. Also very comfy to hold, for me.
Three points of contact (thumb, index finger, middle finger) means that the most comfortable writing implements will have a number of sides evenly dovisible by three.
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