Vol. 12, No. 1: "ConVicted: More Than A Number"

Writing from Inside

Work by Inmates at Monroe State Reformatory, State of Washington

INTRODUCTION

The Richard Hugo House, a community place in Seattle for writers, started the Concerned Lifers Book
Club in the spring of 1998 and has, since, sent over seventy authors to the Monroe State Reformatory.
Meeting monthly, the group receives copies of a book (usually fiction) for everyone in the group to read.
The following month the author goes out to Monroe to discuss the book and talk to the inmates about writing
and publishing their own work. Hugo House also provides individualized help for any person requesting editing
or reviewing of their work.

The idea for this issue evolved partly out of the mens' difficulty in getting their work published in the literary marketplace from inside such an institution. This is not to suggest that none of the writers in the group have never been published; several have. The other inspiration for this issue involves adesire within the group to document the experiences they have shared on Sundays for over eight years running,

Michael Collins is one of our participating writers at Monroe Prison and the principal benefactor, along with Richard Hugo House, of this anthology. In his new book, Death Of A Writer, his main character, E. Robert Pendleton, has been a creative writing professor at a “venerable cradle of mediocrity” in the Midwest for twenty years. Pendleton is more than vaguely aware of how he works the current system of getting published and how it works him. He is keenly aware of a “subworld of lesser presses established ... for tenure-track faculty desperately needing publication.” A system in which washed up writers such as himself participate in what amounts “to an inner sanctum of mutual gratification ... generating a perpetual and self-sustaining machinery of critcal analysis.”

The writers at Monroe State Reformatory, experience-by-experience, are breaking apart any illusions that the system operates by any laws that might allow them a deserved or earned path into print. They share these obstacles with writers anywhere, but when you add to this no access to computers, writing workshops, writing teachers, agents and assiduously arcane methods of even communicating by letter with the outside world—hopelessness would seem sure to prevail. It kind of does but this second anthology doesn't merely exist in a vacuum. Much of the writing here is excellent and Michael Collins, Richard Hugo House and Raven Chronicles have made possible what otherwise would not have been. Members of our group have been published elsewhere and others are on their way. As such, there is a kinship with visiting writers to the prison and a kinship with writers everywhere. And, there will be third and fourth volumes when the well is full again.

—Gary Greaves

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

About the Jon Nelson Prison Program

The Jon Nelson Prison Program was established by Richard Hugo House, in the spring of 1998, in collaboration with the Monroe State Reformatory because “we believe that everyone should have the opportunity to build a vital learning community and to participate in lively cultural dialogue.” Once a month a group of about ten “Concerned Lifers” at Monroe meets with a published author to discuss that author's work, and to talk about the prisoners' own writing processes. In the month leading up to each meeting, the group receives copies of the selected author's work. Since the program's inception, over seventy authors have made the trip out to Monroe.

About Richard Hugo House

Richard Hugo House, founded in 1997, is a Seattle literary arts center for readers, writers and audiences. Offerings include classes, programs, and events to encourage the development of writing as a craft and a method of inquiry. For more information visit <www.hugohouse.org> or call (206) 322-7030.

About Raven Chronicles

The Raven Chronicles publishes and promotes artistic work which documents the profound contribution of art and literature created at the community level. Raven publications reflect the cultural diversity and multitude of viewpoints of writers and artists living in the Pacific Northwest, and other regions of North America and beyond. Raven is published two-three times a year, including occasionally published special issues, like this issue devoted to work by the writers group at Monroe State Reformatory. We seek and publish uncommon poetry, fiction, essays, reviews, black/white art, and interviews. Visit our web site <www.ravenchronicles.org> for current events and excerpts from recent issues. We also publish on our web site original work: food & culture and nature writing.

Thanks to Jon Nelson who has been going out to the prison since 1972 as an advocate for the prisoners in Olympia and who has been a vital support in a myriad of ways over these long years. Thanks to Gary Greaves for conceiving this project and for doing what has to been done to keep it going. Thanks to Phoebe BoschÈ, Scott Martin, Sarah Broudy (intern) and the staff of Raven Chronicles for their work on this publication. Thanks to the Richard Hugo House for its many forms of support, and thanks to the authors, editors, publishers and agents who have all spent a Sunday afternoon in Monroe. A partial list includes:

Charles D'Ambrosio, Jack Cady, Roger Fanning, Arthur Tulee, Riz Rollins, Dick Couch, Ed Weihe, Irving Warner, Jerry Gold, Randall Platt, Stacey Levine, Bharti Kirchner, Jana Harris, Terri Hein, Thomas Orton, Elizabeth Levy, Edward Harkness, Philip Red Eagle, G.M. Ford, Marjorie Reynolds, Kathleen Alcal·, Joan Fiset, Suzy Schnieder, Douglas Thorpe, Matt Briggs, Phoebe BoschÈ, Scott Martin, Greg Bear, Louise Marley, Corinna Wyckoff, Jon Groebner, Flor Fernandez, Jim Knisely, Elizabeth Wales, Skye Moody, Marjorie Reynolds, Judith Roche, Dan Savage, Kirsten Atik, Miguel Ferguson, Professor of Social Work at the University of Texas, and Michael Collins.

A special acknowledgement to a frequent and favorite visitor to the group: 92-year-old Spanish Civil War veteran, Abe Osheroff.