Award-winning poet and University of New Haven professor Randall Horton gives a poetry reading at Carl Robinson Correctional Institution in Connecticut. (Photo: Keenan Hochschild)

Writers’ Talks

Bringing books to life.

How do we remember that those locked up in prison are still a part of our greater society? By returning to prison with writers and poets and artists who remind us that those serving time are our sons & daughters, our aunts & uncles, our mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, and friends. Writers are bridge builders and sharing their art with the men, women, and children in prisons creates new paths for imagining different futures.

Books also remind us that we are still a part of the world, even while Inside. When the Freedom Reads team was opening a library at a prison in Chesapeake, Virginia, one of the guys who was helping to shelve books picked up SA Cosby’s book and said “Man, my mom worked at Lowe’s with this guy!” He then began telling the story about how his mom read early drafts of Blacktop Wasteland, a gritty thriller that won the LA Times Book Award. The excitement about the possibility of SA Cosby coming to that prison to give a reading was infectious.

Terrance Hayes at Otisville Correctional Facility

Poet Terrance Hayes reflects on giving a reading at Otisville Correctional Facility in New York. Terrance wrote us, “They were so engaged we actually talked at some point about the nature of engagement, about the thing we were doing as we did it. I talked to them like practicing readers and writers because that's how they talked. My feeling is any poem you read offers a map, directions/routes for writing. I told them if you write you a writer.”

A black and white sketch of the audience members at Otisville Correctional Facility during a reading by poet Terrance Hayes. The figures are surrounded by notes and reflections from Hayes concerning their discussion, such as, “A brother said when he was in college he’d been persuaded somehow that he wasn’t a poet. I think he said the sonnet had something to do with it.”
Artwork and notes from poet Terrance Hayes reflecting on his reading at Otisville Correctional Facility in New York. (Drawing: Terrance Hayes)
Poet Randall Horton speaks into a microphone, reading his poetry aloud for poetry lovers at Carl Robinson Correctional Institution in Connecticut.
Award-winning poet and University of New Haven professor Randall Horton gives a poetry reading at Carl Robinson Correctional Institution in Connecticut. (Photo: Keenan Hochschild)
Men gather around a table awaiting Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts to sign their copies of FELON after a reading at Woodbourne Correctional Facility in New York.
Freedom Reads Founder & CEO Reginald Dwayne Betts signs copies of his book, FELON, after a reading at Woodbourne Correctional Facility in New York. (Photo: Karen Pearson)
Women at La Vista Correctional Facility in Colorado wait in line eagerly for writer Kali Fajardo-Anstine to sign their copies of Woman of Light after a reading.
Writer Kali Fajardo-Anstine signs books for women inside La Vista Correctional Facility in Colorado after giving a reading there.

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