Prison Camp: Authors Note
A White-Collar Journal forum for criminal justice, lived experience, and the personal search for redemption
Over time, I’ve shared pieces from A DIFFERENT KIND OF HELL, written during my eighteen months in a federal prison camp, often in real time, under conditions that made sustained writing difficult. Some of you may have encountered them in earlier forms, including the Moonstone Press edition, or through occasional excerpts posted here. But I’ve never really introduced the work directly. A new edition of the book is available on Amazon for the first time (linked here). What follows is the Author’s Note from this edition.
Author’s Note
From 2018 to 2019, I served eighteen months in a federal prison camp. During those eighteen months, I committed myself to journaling my experience. But in prison, a journal just doesn’t get to the emotional cellar you fall into, the inner turmoil that prison life presents, the day-to-day wearing down, and the darker and solitary realities of enduring prison life. Over time, my journaling evolved into a collection of memoir fragments, a better vehicle to convey the trauma, the gruelling regimens and protocols and the true center of gravity.
It was challenging to write in prison: no library, freezing cold in the dorm, and no privacy. A long-form narrative was out of the question amidst such conditions, relegating me to musings and spontaneous outpourings whenever and wherever there was opportunity and/or inspiration to compile something. My goal was to convey the experience of incarceration as I was living it, the agony, sense of exile, isolation, and the misery of confinement.
I have added to that post-prison. Much of the enclosed was written at my bunk, with other inmates passing by, gawking and often interrupting. Other times, I’d write in the common computer room where an inmate could draft an email to himself. The sessions were terminated after thirty minutes. A two-hour intermission was required before an inmate could return to a computer. There were always lines and other inmates standing behind me.
Prison is a kind of Dantesque “Dark Wood,” half dream and twilight zone, while the tactile world plays out in confusing rhythms. The most painful part of prison is that it confronts us with ourselves and furthers in each inmate an excruciating self-loathing.
The lead-up and the narrative that presaged my incarceration I’ll leave to the forthcoming, A Prison of My Own—the full narrative: the lead-up, the fall and the aftermath—another kind of and more challenging introspection. The following is solely an attempt to profile the experience of becoming an inmate and the dark corridors of incarceration as I lived them.
The stream-of-consciousness style, the long unpunctuated sentences, and the breathless forward momentum is intentional. It is an attempt to recreate on the page the experience of entering prison: the sense of falling down a well, of losing footing, of one thing tumbling into the next with no pause for reflection or breath.
A DIFFERENT KIND OF HELL is now available on Amazon. As always, I’m grateful to those of you who read, share, and support the work. This is the first time the book has been available on Amazon Books, linked here.
If this piece resonated with you, consider sharing it or leaving a comment. To support this work and help spread awareness about justice reform for white-collar defendants, subscribe to White-Collar Journal and stay connected. John DiMenna is a member of the White Collar Support Group.
Up Next on White Collar Journal:
Wednesday (Justice Notes): Criminal Justice Reform
Thursday (Notes from Exisle): Log/Verse: Daily, fragmented reflections
Sunday (Prison Camp): More Stories from prison
If you’re new to White-Collar Journal, you can read earlier chapters and essays on incarceration, justice, and reentry at whitecollarjournal.com.
Thank you for reading White-Collar Journal. Subscribing is free, and I hope you’ll continue with me as I explore stories of incarceration, justice, and redemption.
If this piece resonated with you, consider sharing it or leaving a comment. To support this work and help spread awareness about justice reform for white-collar defendants, subscribe to White-Collar Journal and stay connected. John DiMenna is a member of the White Collar Support Group.
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