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> Unfortunately, I've been too busy really follow the discussion on
> incarceration that's been going on, but it is a subject in which I am
> intensely interested. Right now I'm taking an undergrad course at Berkeley
> on criminal justice and I'd really like to recommend my professor's book.
> It's called "Crime and Punishment in America," with the subtitle "Why the
> Solutions to America's Most Stubborn Social Crisis Have Not Worked -- and
> What Will." The author is Elliott Currie and it's published by Holt, NY.
> It's a short paperback and it's only about $13. Currie's class is one of
> the best I've ever taken and the explicit purpose of his book is to debunk
> conservative theories of crime and criminal justice. It's a recent book
> (1998) and has up to date stats. He has a whole chapter on "Prison Myths"
> in which he rips on the "studies" of neocon think tanks like the Council on
> Crime.
> If you want to have the facts and figures on hand to immediately
> destroy any conservative idiot who says "America is too soft on crime" then
> this book is a must.
> And no, I'm not getting extra credit for this plug.
Four of the very best books I've read on incarceration are "Straight Life:The Autobiography of Art Pepper", "Born to Die in Medellin", "Men in Prison" by the great Victor Serge and "Assault with a Deadly Weapon: Autobiography of a Street Criminal" by John Allen. The latter contains a blurb by Ramsey Clark that says in part " If you want to understand crime in America, we must understand John Allen...How does the heat of impoverished urban America forge such steel and spin such velvet?" The Art Pepper( one of the greatest jazz musicians who spent most of his life in prison for drug offences) book made my hair stand on end "When I think of prison now the worst part used to be not having sex, being locked away from the good things, just not being free. But now, when I think about it, the thing that hits me first and is the most horrible part of it is to be locked up in an area where you have to listen to that hatred and that hollering--"Git that white boy!" "Kill that n-word!"-- over and over and over and you can't get away from it. I couldn't go to jail again. I just couldn't. I think I wuld have to kill myself rather than go through that again."
Sam Pawlett