The Minnesota Prison Writing Workshop (MPWW) hosted its annual reading in the Klas Center on Oct. 25. Students, staff, faculty and other attendees filled the Kay Fredricks Room to listen to MPWW instructors and alumni read poetry and essay excerpts. This year saw over 200 virtual attendants and a packed room of in-person listeners.
Founded by Hamline Creative Writing adjunct professor Jen Bowen, the workshop collaborates with prisons to hold creative writing classes for incarcerated individuals. The program started in 2011 and now offers classes in all adult state prisons in Minnesota.
“I didn’t intend to start a program, I just wanted to keep teaching,” Bowen explained.
The annual readings are hosted at Hamline with the support of the Hamline Creative Writing Programs (CWP), which supports several literature programs in Minnesota and hosts events throughout the year.
“They’re really good friends of the program,” Bowen said about the CWP’s relationship with the workshop.
The MPWW annual reading found its venue on Hamline due to the assistance of the CWP, and the two groups remain closely connected. Many MPWW instructors also teach at various universities across Minnesota, including several at Hamline. The annual readings draw in not only those related to the workshop program and its students, but also students, staff and faculty involved with the CWP.
The reading offers an opportunity to connect with a relatively isolated part of the literary community. The works read present insight into the prison system through the voices of those both currently and formerly incarcerated by it. It is a night of laughter, sorrow and conversation, driven by powerful writing and impactful deliveries by the readers.
“I’m very glad I came,” junior Ada Adelsheime said. “It’s a neat event.”
This year, the reading hosted sales of books edited by students of MPWW and written by its former students, as well as a raffle for a gumball machine filled with poetry, candy and temporary tattoos. Attendees enjoyed moving works, and the emcees encouraged the audience to respond in a casual manner. Laughter rippled through the room at times, while at others a solemn silence settled in. Notecards were placed on each seat so that attendees could write response letters to the writers.
When asked about the event’s presence on Hamline campus, Adelsheime responded with enthusiasm.
“I honestly think it’s great,” Adelsheime said. “I wish we had more of these.”
Hamline is situated within an expansive literary community that offers countless opportunities for writers, both emerging and experienced, and plays an important role within the Twin Cities writing space. Hosting the workshop’s annual readings is a part of that for the CWP.
“I think it’s one of the ways we show up for the literary community,” Alice Paige, a Hamline Creative Writing adjunct and instructor with MPWW, said.
The prison writing workshop works to help its students publish their writing and offers its writers the opportunity to sell their books at the annual readings alongside the anthology of essays “American Precariat,” which was coedited by a group of 12 incarcerated MPWW writers. These insightful works all offer unique perspectives on society and incarceration and can be found across various literary magazines, anthologies and individual books.
MPWW and the CWP plan to host next year’s reading at Hamline once again for another night of community and connection. More information about MPWW is available on their website.
