Our View: Banning Lamb’s book was unnecessary

Do we have this right: A state agency that wanted to spend upwards of $7 million to $12 million to establish a maternity/day care ward for pregnant inmates at the state’s only women’s prison, York Correctional Center in East Lyme, is the same agency that banned award winning author Wally Lamb’s book “She’s Come Undone” because of the “graphic (sexual) nature of the book’s content”?

This is not the first time Lamb, and his work, has come under the scrutiny of the state Department of Corrections. The question is why?

Lamb, the former Norwich Free Academy educator, appears to be a target ever since his first run in with the agency. As a volunteer at the prison a decade ago, teaching inmates how to write, Lamb was investigated and a group of his students were sued. Their offense: Publishing a collection of stories about their lives -- frank and eye-opening personal accounts.

The lawsuit was eventually settled in favor of the inmates. The department’s relationship with Lamb, however, seems to still be strained - and with no good reason that we can see. And now the department is banning his book because an inmate requested to read it.

The process is that when a request is made, the department’s Media Review Board has to first review the content of the material, and in this case, the board initially found the literature to be inappropriate. But once word of that decision was made public, upon further review, the board reversed itself. The book has since been restored to the prison library.

In some sense this is much ado about nothing -- except for the department’s inexplicable actions to penalize an educator who has had a profound impact on people’s lives. What Lamb has always offered students is the opportunity to express themselves in a positive and personally meaningful way.

Shouldn’t that be the goal: To foster change so that when individuals are released, they re-enter society with a sense of purpose and self-worth?

That’s our opinion. We’d like to hear yours. Email us your thoughts at letters@norwichbulletin.com