I Don't Wish Nobody to Have a Life Like Mine

A veteran teacher gives an “inside” view of the lives of juveniles sentenced as adults

David Chura taught high school in a New York county penitentiary for ten years-five days a week, seven hours a day. In these pages, he gives a face to a population regularly demonized and reduced to statistics by the mainstream media. Through language marked by both the grit of the street and the expansiveness of poetry, the stories of these young people break down the di-visions we so easily erect between us and them, the keepers and the kept-and call into question the increasing practice of sentencing juveniles as adults.

Author Biography

David Chura has worked with at-risk teenagers for forty years. His writing has appeared in the New York Times and multiple literary journals and anthologies, and he is a frequent lecturer and advisor on incarcer-ated youth. Visit his website Kids in the System.