Festival Of Ideas: Erwin James: Redeemable: Darkness and Hope

Festival Of Ideas: Erwin James

Talk

Please note: This event took place in March 2016

Redeemable: Darkness and Hope

Even in the darkness of despair hope and change is possible. Born in Somerset in 1957 to itinerant Scottish parents, Erwin James lost his mother when he was seven. Shipped from home to home after his father turned to alcohol and violence, he committed his first crime of breaking and entering when he was ten. His petty crime turned increasingly violent, culminating in the terrible events for which he was jailed for life in 1984.

Entering prison at 27, James struggled to come to terms with the enormity of his crimes and a future without purpose or hope. Helped to understand the truth of his past by a prison psychologist, his life was transformed. Through reading and education over the next 20 years James was awarded a BA in History and become a regular columnist for the Guardian. Speaking to the very heart of the human condition, Erwin James shows that no matter how far a person may fall, redemption is possible with the right kind of help.

Speaker biography:

Erwin James is a Guardian columnist and author. He has published two collections of essays: A Life Inside: A Prisoner’s Notebook and The Home Stretch: From Prison to Parole. A trustee of the Prison Reform Trust, he has given keynote addresses to the Royal Society in Edinburgh, the Probation Union at the Danish parliament and the Festival of Dangerous Ideas at the Sydney Opera House. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of the Arts and an Honorary Master of the Open University, and is patron of a number of offender rehabilitation charities. Follow him on Twitter @TheErwinJames.


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