Shakespeare Saved My Life

“When I arrived, they never asked me about the weather. It did not matter in there.” ~ Dr. Laura Bates

I don’t often think about the lives of prisoners; I think about their victims. This book redirected my focus. I happen to love Shakespeare, and because I think he also saved my life (sans tragedy), I was drawn in by the plight of these prisoners. This author, Dr. Laura Bates, volunteers to teach Shakespeare in a maximum security prison to the most dangerous population of prisoners there. Crikey.

Her main focus is Larry, a man who had done terrible things. She seems enamored with his native intelligence. I rolled my eyes a few times and braced myself for offensive cliches like: “He’s actually such a good person. He never meant any harm.” That is not how the book unfolds, though. And, frankly, when I saw the landscape of Larry’s life — the things which brought him to his criminal crescendo — it seemed that it could not have ended any other way. Life in prison with no possibility for parole.

Surprisingly, his sentence does not stamp out his intellect. Through the Shakespeare in Shackles Program he ends up doing some impressive things. It really does beg the question — should prisoners be left to rot from the inside out or is there a better way to approach the reparations which simply must be made?

Most interesting was the fact that most of the hardened, violent offenders really liked Shakespeare, understood Shakespeare better that this professor’s graduate students, and related to the tragic characters. They came to understand themselves. They became more cooperative. More goal-oriented. More focused. Shakespeare was some kind of medicine for them. Fascinating stuff, right?

I’d like to go back to the simple black and white view I held of the prison system. It was less demanding. Now, I can’t. Now I find myself thinking of more constructive ways to punish terrible crimes.

This is one of those books that yanks a reader out of his comfort zone. That is the best kind of book, I think.