Actually, I think that dumping plain ASCII text would work with most
"non-dumb" printers.  (E.g., it works with an HP Laserjet I have---about
5 years old but definitely not "DOS era".  The printer normally speaks
some form of PCL (PCL 6, I think), and there's a PostScript option, but
it can print raw ASCII, too.  I often use that for short things
if mono-space is fine and/or if the bother of creating a .tex document
or such is too much hassle.  E.g., to print a part of an email, I
occasionally will highlight the part I want to print, from mutt, then
exit mutt, and type "lpr", paste the text in, and type ^D.  (^&)


I would expect to have troubles printing text with "brainless" printers,
though, such as the low-end ink-jets you can buy for $20 or $30.

-- 
  "I probably don't know what I'm talking about."  http://www.olib.org/~rkr/