August 2025 Newsletter
Freedom Reads: 1 to 500 (and Counting!)
Founder's Take
During the fall of 2021, I drove down a stretch of highway headed towards MCI-Norfolk, a prison in Massachusetts made famous in part by the years that Malcolm X and other prisoners incarcerated there did their thing on a debate team that battled the likes of Harvard and other elite institutions. I was headed there with my Freedom Reads’ team to open our first Freedom Library. It’s a wondrous thing to do something for the first time, and on that morning, having ridden for two hours in the passenger seat, an open laptop as I wrote about the late Michael K Williams, I struggled with the juxtaposition I’ve lived with since handcuffs first graced my wrists: the possibility and potential of Black men and all the public ways we often die too soon. Williams once told me that his dream was to build a center where young folks who were like he once was, desiring more than the violence and poverty around them, could actively envision better tomorrows and learn dance and acting and what it means to be safe. That is part of my dream for the Freedom Library.
At MCI-Norfolk, I thought that one Freedom Library meant we’d done the thing. That is, until a brother wrote us and asked “what about the rest of us?” That one question humbled me and changed Freedom Reads mission. No longer one Freedom Library in each of a thousand prisons. With that letter, it became one Freedom Library for each of the 20,000 cellblocks that exist in this country. Why not confront what sometimes feels like an overwhelming impulse to be punitive with an overwhelming impulse to be generous?
And it’s humbling to think of what the Freedom Reads team just did: returned to York Correctional Institution, the women’s prison in Connecticut. This was the first prison where we opened a Freedom Library on every cellblock back in 2023. The women there at first wondered why we showed up. Some wondered who facilitated the beautiful curved bookcases and brand new books that we carried with us. I heard a story of how a correctional officer’s entire demeanor changed when he was given an Anthony Bourdain book and I remembered how all of us just desire to be seen. And realized we needed to bring a Freedom Library for staff at every prison as well. The prison let us know they opened two additional cellblocks and needed two more Freedom Libraries. And we returned with our 500th Freedom Library that the entire Freedom Reads team built together. I must say, though we’ve built 500 of these, that was the first that I’d put together, reinforcing for me that our work is a team effort. And you too are part of the Freedom Reads team.
There is always more to do is what this life has taught me. And there is always help needed to do what must be done. Your support helped us keep the promise we made to the men at MCI Norfolk. The promise we fulfilled first at York when we opened a Freedom Library on every cellblock and then again this month when we returned because more were needed. Donate today and help us get that Freedom Library on every cellblock in every prison in this country. What is a movement if not just regular people saying that we believe hope and possibility is as essential as air, and that freedom begins with a book.
Reginald Dwayne Betts
Freedom Reads Founder & CEO
Freedom Reads Opens 500th Freedom Library
August 14, 2025 (Hamden, CT) – The national nonprofit Freedom Reads opened its 500th Freedom Library at York Correctional Institution, Connecticut’s only prison for women. With the opening of the 500th library, Freedom Reads will have brought Freedom Libraries to 51 adult and youth prisons across 15 states. In late 2023, Freedom Reads opened 11 libraries at York and with these new additions, every cellblock at York Correctional Institutions in Niantic, CT will have a Freedom Library.
Meet The Team: Freedom Reads 2025 Summer Interns
By Mobolaji Otuyelu, Creative Research Associate at Freedom Reads
To encapsulate their summer spent at Freedom Reads, our interns reflected on experiences that were both deeply personal and profoundly connected to the organization’s mission. A shared sentiment ran through each of their reflections: gratitude for the opportunity to contribute to meaningful work and admiration for the passion of the Freedom Reads team. At the same time, each intern brought a distinct perspective, shaped by the projects they took on and the memories they carried away.
One thing I will never forget is when David told me that the work I do makes an everlasting impact on the work Freedom Reads does in the future.
Reading the letters from the inside is something I’ll always carry with me. Each one was so personal and honest—it made the impact of Freedom Reads feel real in a way nothing else could.
I have a deeper respect not only for the intellectual work that drives Freedom Reads, but also for the physical labor behind it, from crafting the bookshelves to transporting entire libraries into prisons.
The power of Freedom Reads is in it’s deliverance of the inspiring thoughts and words of those Inside, and I am forever humbled and moved by the dedication and intellect of the team behind this work.
Freedom Reads in the Media
This summer, our work was highlighted by one of our funders, the Mellon Foundation, whose support sustains this work. And in Colorado, the Aspen Daily News spoke with Dwayne Betts before his event where he read and discussed Doggerel. Mitzi Rapkin, organizer of the event, noted:
“As the founder and producer of the literary podcast First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing, I've conducted more than 500 author interviews and have done a few dozen live in front of an audience; yet, I've never seen a writer get a standing ovation until I invited Dwayne Betts to the stage. He mesmerized the audience with his humanity, his vulnerability, and genuine depth of feeling that covered the range from laughter to tears.”
Dwayne's appearance on the First Draft: A Dialogue on Writing podcast will be available on LitHub this September.
Upcoming Events
Planet Word | 500 and Counting! A Freedom Reads Celebration
This fall, Freedom Reads celebrates two powerful milestones: the 20th anniversary of our founder Reginald Dwayne Betts’s release from prison and the opening of our 500th Freedom Library. Join us at Planet Word for a special evening with Dwayne as he shares how books transform prison cellblocks into spaces of freedom — and reads from his new poetry collection, Doggerel. Reserve a spot here.
Why This Work Matters
In each newsletter we aim to share at least one letter (or excerpt) from one of Freedom Reads now 37,000-plus Freedom Library patrons. Freedom Reads receives many letters from the Inside. They mean so much to us. And we respond to each and every one of them. We also include comments from DoC officials that appreciate our work.
I've been enjoying these libraries in other units. This newer unit opened up about two months ago. We've been kind of hodgepodging together our own library, passing books around and stuff. So I was so grateful that we were getting our own Freedom Library here within these walls meant to divide.
I feel like reading is best for us because it lets us escape to a place outside of here.