THERE are locked doors and security cameras between me and the outside world.
On my way into the building, I pass through a metal detector, but my destination isn’t a boarding gate at Dublin Airport.
Instead, I’m sitting in a small room with ten inmates from Dublin’s Mountjoy Prison, several of whom I know well — because I’ve written about their crimes in the past. Or at least I thought I knew them well.
Over the course of the afternoon, I would engage in a series of discussions with individuals I never expected to meet face-to-face in my life.
The meeting had been arranged after Senator Lynn Ruane contacted me in March of this year to ask if I would be willing to meet with a group of inmates in ‘The Joy’.
When I asked what the purpose of the meeting was, Senator Ruane explained to me that it was related to the Theatre of the Oppressed project she was running along with artist Grace Dyas.
