September 2024 Newsletter

Freedom Reads: Rewriting Our Futures

Freedom Reads Communications Manager Steven Parkhurst (left), Freedom Reads Library Coordinator David Perez Jr (center), and Freedom Reads Library Production Assistant Michael Byrd (right) sit outside of Cybulski Community Reintegration Center sign.
Freedom Reads Communications Manager Steven Parkhurst (left), Freedom Reads Library Coordinator David Perez Jr (center), and Freedom Reads Library Production Assistant Michael Byrd (right) outside of Cybulski Community Reintegration Center.

Founder's Take

This is what David Foster Wallace says – the only choice we get is what we worship. And for many years, I have worshipped a Janus-Faced G-d. The G-d of Silence and the G-d of Discontent. I've probably worshipped other g-ds as well, maybe we all have. But these days I think a lot about silence and discontent. It's wild, too, in a way, as someone recently said to me, Dwayne, I'm surprised you complain about anything, look at how charmed your life is. 
 
And in a way, they are right. Though, I confess, I cannot stop thinking of the ways that people looked at me, just four years ago: felony convictions, rumored to be incapable of getting a real job. I remember how people looked at me when I got to Yale. Wondered if I belonged. Even after law school, I barely became an attorney. I also failed the bar once. Feared I'd fail it again.
 
And I've always been a felon.
 
I've never run anything in my life before Freedom Reads. Never. 
 
And yet here we are. And I often wonder how we got here, how we are here still. The only choice we get is what we worship. 
 
In this life I've learned, I guess, that picking up a gun as a teenager and demanding everything someone else owned means if I am to worship, one of the things I must believe is worthy of paying attention to is my own need for forgiveness and mercy. And if worship is to pay attention, this is what I do. 
 
I think about culture a lot. Organizational culture. What it means to build a team that leads with an understanding that we can easily not be here, doing this work. 
 
One of the reasons I've never had a job in this life is because I was fired from my first job. I worked in a prison kitchen. I'd gotten bullied a bit and found myself wanting to get fired to avoid hurting someone. Then I got fired and sent to the hole. Prison taught me to get along. Taught me that we can be the catalyst for anything we want to be in this world. 
 
I was once the catalyst for so much suffering. Then, I got older, and was again the catalyst for more suffering. Funny thing is that the first time I wanted to be forgiven because I thought I was too stupid or young to realize the person didn't deserve to suffer so and that I had no right to make them; now, being older, mostly I regret all the times I thought someone deserved to suffer and I was here to make them.
 
These days, I am reminded that I am here because of so many times I have been forgiven. And I'm sad, quite sad, that I've been forgiven in this world far more times than I've forgiven. It's the kind of thing that makes a good person weep, I suppose. 
 
Wallace also says: The really important kind of freedom involves attention, and awareness, and discipline, and effort, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them, over and over, in myriad petty little unsexy ways, every day. 
 
And I'll add: the most important freedom involves doing this and knowing that the prerequisite for mercy, for joy, for abundance, for giving those things in the way that you see lovely, is not that the person deserves it. Shit, it is that you are a human being who deserves the joy that comes from remembering one day you'll need grace.
 
But what do I know? I think DFW knew a bit. He was wrong about Andre Agassi though. I wish he'd found that out. Sometimes it takes a person time to figure out who they should be in the world. And I sure hope someone doesn't decide who I am before I get a chance to be it.

Reginald Dwayne Betts
Freedom Reads Founder & CEO

42 Freedom Libraries Opened Across Connecticut Prisons

This month, the Freedom Reads team, with generous support from the Connecticut Health and Educational Facilities Authority (CHEFA) and Connecticut Senators Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal, opened 42 Freedom Libraries across three Connecticut prisons – MacDougall-Walker Correctional Institution, Cybulski Community Reintegration Center, and Cheshire Correctional Institution. 

Rewriting Our Futures

Freedom Reads Communications Manager Steven Parkhurst (left), Freedom Reads Library Coordinator David Perez Jr (center), and Freedom Reads Library Production Assistant Michael Byrd (right) sit outside of Cybulski Community Reintegration Center sign.
Freedom Reads Communications Manager Steven Parkhurst (left), Freedom Reads Library Coordinator David Perez Jr (center), and Freedom Reads Library Production Assistant Michael Byrd (right) outside of Cybulski Community Reintegration Center.

Freedom Reads Communications Manager Steven Parkhurst reflects on the impact of opening Freedom Libraries in Connecticut prisons where he and other Freedom Reads team members served time.

The Unit Talks, where we addressed the new Freedom Library Patrons, were not just about the origin story of Freedom Reads or the fact that our team is some 50% formerly incarcerated. It was about something deeper. Our message to them was clear: the world is ready for you. We talked about how freedom, dignity, and opportunity await them, and how the Freedom Libraries they now have access to can open new doors for their future.

Full Access to Freedom Libraries at MCI - Norfolk

Freedom Reads Library Coordinator David Perez Jr and Freedom Library Patron Hector stand in front of a Freedom Library at MCI - Norfolk.
Freedom Reads Library Coordinator David Perez Jr (right) and Freedom Library Patron Hector (left) with a Freedom Library at MCI - Norfolk.

At the beginning of the month, the Freedom Reads team opened five additional Freedom Libraries at Massachusetts Correctional Institution at Norfolk, ensuring all incarcerated individuals there have access to a Freedom Library.

Finding Moments of Joy on the Inside

Freedom Reads Library Coordinator David Perez Jr reflects on the act of celebration in prison, and fostering connection during his time Inside and his work with Freedom Reads.

It was a reminder that even within the confines of incarceration, the human spirit could find moments of joy and celebration.

Hear from our Freedom Library Patrons

Visit our Kites from the Inside and Overheard in the Library pages to read and hear directly from Freedom Library patrons like Christopher.

Freedom Reads in the Media

This month, the Stamford Advocate covered our Freedom Library openings in Connecticut. And, the Richmond Free Press reported on the 27th Annual Virginia Literary Awards, where Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts was awarded the Library of Virginia’s honorary Patron of Letters degree. Plus, author Rachel Kushner shouted out Freedom Reads in her Elle Shelf Life interview. 

Why This Work Matters

Artwork of an open books with "Freedom Begins with a book" written on it by Chelsea, Inside Literary Prize judge at Minnesota Correctional Facility - Shakopee.
Artwork by Chelsea, Inside Literary Prize judge at Minnesota Correctional Facility - Shakopee.

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.

Today, after reading the daily “memo of the day” (Shakopee’s prison wide paper notification/update system) where Ms. Smith posted the announcement of the ILP Award Winner and a nice recognition for all 24 judges, I called my mother and tearfully, happy ones of course, told her the book I voted for won! I asked her to look online for the podcast & anything else she could find. As she’s looking and we’re talking, she goes “oh my I found your name.” I said “what where.” She proceeds to tell me in an article that quoted me talking about being able to be Chelsea, to have a voice that mattered, to not be my ID #. As she read it she got emotional. I was already tearing up, but to hear my mom get emotional over it was even more real for me, and next thing I know I’m crying saying to her, “yes that’s me, they made my voice matter.” And then the phone recording came on telling us that we only had 10 seconds remaining on our call. So we said our goodbyes, talk to you later, love you, & she added, “I’m proud of you I’ll keep looking.” … Thank you FR for bringing me more than just an escape from prison. Thank you for reminding me that my voice matters still, that I’m more than [my number], and that I’m capable of making history.


Chelsea
, Inside Literary Prize judge at Minnesota Correctional Facility - Shakopee

Our work isn’t possible without your support. Thank you for supporting our vision to open a Freedom Library in every cellblock in every prison in America.