Amazon.com (ISBN 0140273050, Paperback)

From the Autobiography of an Imprisoned Peon (1904), the memoirs of an indentured slave, to Jack Henry Abbott's In the Belly of the Beast, this collection presents sobering accounts of American prison life throughout the century. The stories come from all perspectives--innocent and guilty, comical and terrifying--but their common thread is the dehumanizing nature of prison existence. Sometimes poignant, sometimes violent, sometimes even funny, these stories are consistently disturbing and sobering glimpses into the incarcerated life. Prison Writing in 20th-Century America speaks for a largely silent but growing population. As the percentage of Americans who are incarcerated continues to climb, the stories in this book--and their testimonial to the depths to which both the jailed and the jailers can sink--become all the more urgent. --Lisa Higgins