As part of a new initiative with our partners Give a Book and Prison Reading Group, RSL Fellows will be contributing book recommendations to Inside Time, the magazine for prison readers. The first writer to appear in the magazine is Max Porter, former bookseller and editor. His first novel, Grief Is the Thing with Feathers, won the Sunday Times/Peter, Fraser + Dunlop Young Writer of the Year, the International Dylan Thomas Prize, the Europese Literatuurprijs and the BAMB Readers’ Award and was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award and the Goldsmiths Prize. His second book, Lanny, was published in 2019 and longlisted for the Booker Prize. Max was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2020.
Max’s recommendations were:
Chain Gang All-stars, Nana Kwame Adjeya Brenya
Loretta Thurwar and Hamara “Hurricane Staxxx” Stacker are the stars of a highly-popular, highly-controversial, profit-raising program in America’s private prison industry. It’s the return of the gladiators, and prisoners are competing for the ultimate prize: their freedom.
This book blew my mind. A brutal and disturbing indictment of American society, racism, the prison system and violence as entertainment. Also hugely entertaining and ultimately very moving.
Memorial, Alice Oswald
A long poem, an account of Homer’s Iliad without the Gods, about the minor war-dead, most of whom are little more than names, but each of whom lives and dies unforgettably – and unforgotten.
The book I go to remind me why I love poetry, why I love language, why I want to feel good writing hammering in my head. Pure magic on every page.
Riddley Walker, Russel Hoban
Wandering a desolate post-apocalyptic landscape, speaking a broken-down English lost after the end of civilization, Riddley Walker sets out to find out what brought humanity here. This is his story.
The strangest and most surprising novel I’ve ever read. It teaches you to read it. It teaches you to see the world differently.
The Road, Cormac McCarthy
In a burned-out America, a father and his young son walk under a darkened sky, heading slowly for the coast. They have no idea what, if anything, awaits them there.
An apocalyptic masterpiece by a writer who forged a new vision of American life. Manages to be genuinely horrifying as well as deeply beautiful and ultimately hopeful.
CROW, Ted Hughes
An English poetic landmark. A deep engagement with history, mythology and the natural world combine to forge a work of impressive and unsettling force.
A mate of mine was sent this when he was in prison and said Crow changed his life. One of the heaviest, funniest, wildest book of poems the 20th century produced.