Prison & Justice Writing
For more than four decades, PEN America’s Prison Writing Program has amplified the writing of thousands of imprisoned writers by providing free resources, skilled mentors, and audiences for their writing. We are proud to share our deepening commitment to confronting our era of mass incarceration with the launch of the PEN America Writing For Justice Fellowship. Read below for more information about our initiatives.
Works of Justice Publications
Works of Justice is an online series that features content connected to the PEN America Prison and Justice Writing Program, reflecting on the relationship between writing and incarceration, and presenting challenging conversations about criminal justice in the United States.
In response to the pandemic, we’ve launched Temperature Check: Covid-19 Behind Bars, a new rapid response series featuring original creative reportage by incarcerated writers, accompanied by podcast interviews with criminal justice reform experts on the pandemic’s impact in United States’ prisons.
Writing for Justice Fellowship
PEN America’s Writing for Justice Fellowship commissions writers—emerging or established—to create written works of lasting merit that illuminate critical issues related to mass incarceration and catalyze public debate. Learn more about the current Fellows »
Prison Writing Program
Founded in 1971, the PEN Prison Writing Program believes in the restorative, rehabilitative and transformative possibilities of writing. We provide hundreds of imprisoned writers across the country with free writing resources, skilled mentors, and audiences for their work. Our program supports free expression, and encourages the use of the written word as a legitimate form of power. We strive towards an increasingly integrative approach, aiming to amplify the voices and writing of imprisoned people to expand beyond the silo of prison, and identity of prisoner.
Download a printable PDF copy of our offerings.
Handbook for Writers in Prison
PEN’s Handbook for Writers in Prison features detailed guides on the art of writing fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and screenplays—an invaluable resource for any writer. Each year, thousands of free copies are sent to incarcerated men and women.
Annual Prison Writing Contest
Every year hundreds of imprisoned writers from around the country submit poetry, fiction, nonfiction, and dramatic works to PEN’s Prison Writing Contest, one of the few outlets of free expression for the country’s incarcerated population.
Mentorship Program
Consisting of more than 250 mentors working with close to 250 incarcerated writers, PEN America’s Prison Writing Mentorships continues to be the most interactive and engaging project in the Prison Writing Program.
The Prison Writing Contest Prizes are sponsored by the generous support of the Greenburger Center for Social & Criminal Justice.
Programming for PEN America’s Prison Writing Program is made possible in part by generous funding from the Stavros Niarchos Foundation.
Read Award-Winning Works from the PEN Prison Writing Contest
Fireside: or Immaterial Burns
"The leather strained as Tyrone leaned forward to push in the cigarette lighter, and again, when he sat back in the seat." More
My Co-Worker
"My co-worker makes parole. / No goodbyes. Just disappears one day." More
Young Girl Twenty
"The type of chick that young thugs’ll wait on, / and older catz lose they weight on / Modestly fly, sour chicks couldn’t play Dawn" More
All of Us, In Prison
"some prisons, by the night, / will never let you go, / and some prisons, in the light, / will never let you go." More
Confessions of a Penitentiary Death Dealer
"I was 21 years old and the last thing I was interested in was this, the last article I read before tossing the newspaper in my trash." More
Triple Sessions
"I grew up at perhaps the tail end of the “spare the rod, spoil the child” generation, so violence was normalized and mitigated with life lessons." More
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PEN America On 
Good news about the fate of arrested Chinese dissidents is rare. His own smile in this picture well reflects how we feel about word that Professor Xu Zhangrun, jailed for an essay critical of Xi Jinping, has been released from detention. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/12/world/asia/xu-zhangrun-china-xi.html?referringSource=articleShare
Find inspiration with PEN/Faulkner award winner @JamesHannaham's installment of the PEN to Paper video series as he stirs the imagination to craft detailed, authentic characters! https://bit.ly/2Zh5ElS
Tune into Bela Shayevich's Just Press Play playlist from @penworldvoices - a curated collection of Soviet darkwave music, the "sounds of perestroika." Listen here: https://bit.ly/3f6cgui. #penworldvoices