Comments on: Writing in prison, and writing to prisoners: the inmate who became the literary darling

By: Sarah in CA

Sarah in CA — Sat, 07 Feb 2009 19:47:00 +0000

I wrote to one who was a friend of a friend for support… but since we didn’t actually know each other that well, after 3-4 exchanged letters, he didn’t write back (probably because I wouldn’t provide pictures of myself, provocative or not).

By: Becky

Becky — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 20:40:30 +0000

beast, yes–something in me just didn’t want to spell it out i guess! and susan, well, she’s definitely not afraid of being incendiary. and as for her attendance at the trial, she was very tight with mailer at the time & that was her impetus for going.

By: Marta

Marta — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 14:22:47 +0000

One of my best friends had to spend 11 months in state prison. I went to visit him every week and we wrote letters back and forth the entire time. I have them in chronological order in a book that I am planning on giving him next year when his probation is finally up. Its really tough in there and its not so easy to see one of your good friends in that kind of situation. If I hadn’t visited he said he probably would’ve gone crazy since no one else bothered to make the drive to see him except me and his dad.

By: Renee

Renee — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 05:54:20 +0000

I have a box of letters between me and an inmate in a Federal prison. It seemed they had it a lot better than the stereotypical inmate. More just of a boring routine than anything… I still wouldn’t want to go though.

By: Jill

Jill — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 05:50:39 +0000

Several years ago I briefly corresponded with a prison inmate. He’d gotten my address from some very old pen-pal list. His tale was humorous – he was serving 15 years merely for stealing a loaf of bread to feed his starving family. (Really, that’s what he told me.) I didn’t correspond with him long enough for him to start requesting provocative photos or anything; by the third letter he was asking for postage stamps and other things, and I jsut stopped writing.

By: TGecko

TGecko — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 05:42:17 +0000

There’s a typo in this post: the title of Abbott’s memoir is written as “The Belly of the Beat” above.

By: dave

dave — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 05:39:32 +0000

ok, so maybe i should know more about this, but susan sarandon named her child after a murderer? that makes her sound insane.

here’s a fun fact: you left the ’s’ out of “beast” in your story.

maybe i’ll write a convict and see what happens!

By: gus

gus — Thu, 04 Oct 2007 02:15:32 +0000

While I have never been in prison, I know several people who have. I have been told one motivator for getting people to write to them is personal saftey. Some sadistic guards “fucque” with people with no outside contacts. The prisoners have no recourse, con’s word against guard’s word.