PRISON WRITING PROGRAM

Founded in 1971, the PEN Prison Writing Program believes in the restorative and rehabilitative power of writing, by providing hundreds of inmates across the country with skilled writing teachers and audiences for their work. The program seeks to provide a place for inmates to express themselves freely with paper and pen and to encourage the use of the written word as a legitimate form of power. The program sponsors an annual writing contest, publishes a free handbook for prisoners, provides one-on-one mentoring to inmates whose writing shows merit or promise, conducts workshops for former inmates, and seeks to get inmates' work to the public through literary publications and readings.

PEN's Handbook for Writers in Prison features detailed guides on the art of writing fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and screenplays. This is an invaluable resource to any incarcerated writer. Send a handbook to a writer in Prison.

The 25/12 Campaign:
Help Support the Prison Writing Program! Send 12 handbooks to writers in prison.

Members of the Prison Writing Committee interview the 2008 contest winners.

Hettie Jones & Charles Norman

Although much of my “prison” work is dark and tragic, I’m actually the class clown, and my humor is an important part of who I am. I have to be careful to suppress it in prison, though, for those who rule us are humorless, and easily offended, such tempting targets for mockery . . .[More]

Sarah White & Yvette Louisell

I sit and write in a frenzy, almost always late at night and sometimes so late that I have to write by the light of the hallway. (Lights out is at 11:30 p.m. Mon.-Fri. and 12:30 a.m. Sat. and Sun., but our doors don’t lock here. As long as I’m not bothering my roommate or whatever officer is on duty, I can crack my door open, sit on the floor, and write past lights out.) [More]

Ernest Rich

They don’t feed (us) much here at Pamlico. We seldom get meat at breakfast. They don’t always serve what is on menu. Eggs and grits. Eggs are not real. Grits are bland. Oatmeal don’t taste like oatmeal. They boil it too long to destroy all the vitamins. [More]

Malachi Ephraim

I awakened today around 5 a.m., in a better mood than usual. Lying on my left side, facing the cell door, I gazed at the prison gray walls and enjoyed the early morning light illuminating the cell block interior. [More]

Richard Parker

I decided I am going to put this booklet in the mail tonight. [More]

Every year hundreds of inmates from around the country submit poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and dramatic plays to PEN's Prison Writing Contest, one of the few outlets of free expression for the country's incarcerated. Manuscripts come to us in many forms: handwritten, typed, and written in the margins of legal documents.

The Prison Writing Committee is proud to announce the winners of the 2009 Prison Writing Contest.

>> See complete 2009 winners list

I Wore Chains to My Father's Funeral
by Charles P. Norman

In her grief, my mother bought pants the same size as I wore in high school, forgetting that I had added thirty pounds in the past eighteen years, but I made do. In the mirror I adjusted my tie and stared at the well-dressed stranger who stared back at me. Who was that man? [More]

A Fresh End
by Zachary Redfearne

The irony here is that probably no one knows who this Sanitos is or even who named this place. People read up on pariahs. We slobber over scandals, not saints. [More]

Locker Key
by Kevin Costa

Now, still watching dutifully
he smiles
as his son walks to him
from across the visiting room
wearing his prison blues. [More]

Dead Men’s Shoes
by Chris Everley

The yard was spotted with them, and still more were coming . . . Figures of charred and smoke-blackened flesh wrapped snugly in grey blankets, lying on the cold ground. [More]

Every Day's Your Birthday
by Keith Sanders

Sarah: No, no. It’s all right. I was happy—happy for him. He was here, Nick, he really was. Your father’s not going to get any better . . .

Nick: Do you need me—

Sarah: No, Nick. I can manage. [More]