July 2026 Newsletter

We landed in a beautiful city. But it was the wrong city. A dozen hours in the air, a butter-soft landing in Lisbon, and then I realized we needed to be in Porto, a three-hour drive away. By the time we’d gotten to Porto (my sons, my love, my guilt for adding hours onto a long trip), I’d half forgotten I was there for the Babell Festival, but would be reminded of the power of holding a book in your hands.

See, invited by Rui Courier, I was there for a run of chances to speak of the irresistible magic of literature in three forums. I was being featured in billboards around the city alongside Margaret Atwood and Salman Rushdie. Okay, they had billboards; I had a poster.

The city was the festival. Long lines of people with books that served as admission to the events. Thousands watching Rushdie and Atwood. I participated in a public conversation about poetry, prison, and what I kept calling the improbable and unlikely steps that landed me in their lovely city. After, a woman walked past my two sons. Spoke to them through tears and asked to hug me. A group of scholars translated poems from Doggerel into Portuguese. Hearing my own work in Portuguese, juxtaposed with my English and all these names I carry in my head, in the city of Fernando Passoao: I felt like a poet in Portugal.

Then this happened - and this is the part you won’t believe. I come back to the hotel in Porto, called Wine and Books, and get to talking to the attendant. “Those fake books above you bother me,” I say, pointing at these giant fake display decorations. “I mean, I’m joking, but I am a poet.”

“You write poems? I write poems.” He then explains how poets and writers are heroes to him, that he has lived in South Africa and Algeria and all over the world, and writers are “the great people.”

I’m trying to explain Freedom Reads but struggle with the language barrier. Then I remember I’m the last story profiled in Rui’s book, about people who’ve changed their communities and countries through the power of books. I let Fernando read it.

A bit later, he printed out his own writing and gave it to me. In English and Portuguese. I remind myself that Dua Lipa included the French translation of Felon in her Manifesto Library, itself housed in the lower level of the most beautiful bookstore I’ve ever walked in. I think of Fernando, the world traveler who believes my poems matter. And I know freedom does begin with a book.

If you agree, if anyone has ever blessed you with a book that transformed your thinking, if you wish they had, or if you simply think I’m fly with these sentences, support Freedom Reads with a donation this month. We’re closing in on 700 freedom libraries placed within reach of those who need them most.

By Craig Gore, Communications Associate, Freedom Reads

Hear from Craig about his experience of overcoming the technological struggles that come after being incarcerated.

Meet Communications Associate James Davis III one of our incredible storytellers who brings to life stories from inside prisons across America for the rest of the world.

Each newsletter we aim to share at least one letter (or excerpt) from one of Freedom Reads now 65,000-plus Freedom Library patrons. Freedom Reads receives many letters from the Inside. They mean so much to us. And we respond to each and every one of them.

Publishers Weekly - ‘The Business of Forgiveness’: Martine Leavitt and Kristen McCallum in Conversation

The Adviser Magazine - Dwayne Betts on the Iliad

The Atlantic - The Atlantic Announces First Speakers and Programming for the 18th Annual Atlantic Festival, September 17–19 in New York