Doing Time: 25 Years of Prison Writing

May 3, 1999
Since 1973, PEN has sponsored an annual literary competition for prisoners. This anthology, selected from roughly 1700 submissions, showcases efforts that range widely in form, subject matter and quality. In a foreword, Sister Helen Prejean of Dead Man Walking fame touches on some of the questions readers will have: "Watch for the self-serving subtext. When your heart is moved, can you trust it? When you feel for the writers of these words, are you being had?" The book is broken into thematic sections such as "Initiation," "Time and Its Terms," "Family" and "Death Row." Though Chevigny made an attempt to include more women writers, women make up only 7% of the prison population, so the collection is overwhelmingly male. Anthony LaBaarca Falcone's poem, "A Stranger," uses circus imagery to mourn the daughter's childhood he missed. David Wood's eerily memorable story, "Feathers on the Solar Wind," is a searing portrait in which AIDS prods a man to accept personal and spiritual responsibility. Not surprisingly, most of these stories, poems and essays lack polish. But even some of the roughest pieces are driven by an emotional power that gives the sense of spending time with people who are composing not just for pleasure but for high stakes--the definition of a self, the confronting of personal demons, even redemption.