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Chapter 4 - Hours of Lead

The Modern US Prison, Segregation and Solidarity

from Part I - Lyric Cells

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 October 2021

Andrea Brady
Affiliation:
Queen Mary University of London
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Summary

This chapter shows how the derangement of the senses and isolation of the individual that are idealised modes of Romantic and post-Romantic verse are hideously intensified in the contemporary supermax. Its focus is on solitary confinement in US prisons as a way of preventing the formation of solidarities. As such, it explores the conditions for producing poetry in prison: different models of the workshop, reform and revolution, and imprisoned writers’ relationships to the carceral and poetic institution. It discusses the trope of incommunicability in prison writing. It discusses the psychic and physical effects of life ‘in the hole’, drawing on writings by numerous well-known and lesser-known imprisoned poets. It ends with the claim that it is the contemporary abolitionist movement that is the true inheritor and defender of the Romantic imagination.

Type
Chapter
Information
Poetry and Bondage
A History and Theory of Lyric Constraint
, pp. 112 - 148
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2021

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  • Hours of Lead
  • Andrea Brady, Queen Mary University of London
  • Book: Poetry and Bondage
  • Online publication: 08 October 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108990684.005
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  • Hours of Lead
  • Andrea Brady, Queen Mary University of London
  • Book: Poetry and Bondage
  • Online publication: 08 October 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108990684.005
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Hours of Lead
  • Andrea Brady, Queen Mary University of London
  • Book: Poetry and Bondage
  • Online publication: 08 October 2021
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108990684.005
Available formats
×