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As an English major in college, I spent a lot of time reading and discussing literature with other English majors. But author and literature professor Mikita Brottman gains a completely different perspective on literature by reading with prisoners—which she discusses in her captivating non-fiction account, The Maximum Security Book Club.
The story follows Brottman through two years of leading a weekly book club at the Jessup Correctional Institution in Maryland. Each week, she gathers with nine prisoners—many of whom are serving long-term sentences for violent crimes—to discuss works of literature. She looks forward to their weekly routine, though it often means working around prison lockdowns and prisoner setbacks. And as she engages them in discussions about everything from Conrad’s Heart of Darkness to Kafka’s The Metamorphosis to Bukowski’s Ham on Rye, she also learns more about the men, their perspectives, and their lives inside their dreary, colorless compound.
For anyone who’s spent hours listening to lectures and engaging in discussions about literature, The Maximum Security Book Club will give you a new and completely unexpected perspective. The prisoners in the club may sometimes seem distracted and frustrated by their readings, but the discussions take an interesting twist when they get sidetracked. The prisoners connect the readings to their own lives in surprising ways—ways that will also give you a new perspective on prison life and the men living it.
Despite the setting of her book club—and the grim warnings from the prison staff—Brottman generally treats the members like any other literature students. Though she mentions the men’s often violent history when she introduces them, she focuses more on their thoughts and observations—and, like Brottman, you may be surprised to find yourself seeing beyond these men’s crimes and liking them for their personalities and reflections.
Her literary choices, meanwhile, are often quite surprising; she doesn’t shy away from dark, depressing, and even violent literature. And though it certainly helps if you know at least a little bit about the featured works, the discussions might also pique your interest and inspire you to seek out or reread some of them.
Unfortunately, the nature of the book—covering a weekly meeting that’s still ongoing—gives it no natural conclusion. Brottman takes her readers through 10 literary works before the book simply comes to an end—and end that can be frustrating for those who have gotten to know the characters, only to find themselves abruptly cut off from them and their stories. There isn’t much closure here—though Brottman does provide an afterward, which follows two of the original members in their lives after their release from prison. Here is where her generally upbeat attitude takes a hit—and it ends an otherwise eye-opening book on a melancholy (and somewhat less than satisfying) note.
Still, if you love literature—and you still fondly remember those long discussions in lit class—you’ll be fascinated by these unlikely scholars and their observations. Though the book is sometimes challenged by the constraints of non-fiction, it’s sure to leave you with new insights into both literature and humanity.
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