"I remember thinking, if he can write about prison and make it sing, then I can, too. That is what drove me, and I was chasing a kind of joy - maybe a kind of permission - to be a witness to what was going on. I think I'm driven by questions I want to answer, but also I'm driven toward writing about the joy of the world, no matter where you might be in that world."
""We put millions of people in the prisons - what if we put millions of books in the prisons?" said Betts, who was prosecuted as an adult after committing an armed carjacking at 16. "And what if we did it as a Freedom Library, one cell block at a time, with beautifully handcrafted bookcases that are accessible on each side to create the oasis of literature? That really is the idea for Freedom Reads," Betts said, adding, "it satisfies a long-standing need. So, we get to bring that to communities, and we get to recognize that sometimes one book will change your life.""
Reginald Dwayne Betts began writing poetry at 17 and discovered pivotal Black poets while in solitary confinement after a book was slid beneath his cell door. That exposure inspired him to write about prison, pursue joy, and witness life. He served a nine-year sentence and later became a MacArthur Fellow, a lawyer, a visiting lecturer at Harvard, and the author of six books, including a one-man theater adaptation exploring life after incarceration. He founded Freedom Reads to place books and Freedom Libraries in prisons with handcrafted, double-sided bookcases to create literary oases and address a long-standing need.
Read at Oregon ArtsWatch * Arts & Culture News
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