WRITING from within prison and about prison life will be showcased at an event at the University of York tomorrow night.

It is the culmination of the university’s Prison Fictions and Human Rights project which has been taking place this year.

The event has been organised in conjunction with English PEN, a charity which promotes freedom to read and write for people incarcerated, and also marks the launch of York PEN. The event will include representatives from local prisons, and writers who have spent time working with prisoners.

Gillian Slovo, author and president of English PEN, will talk on political imprisonment, drawing on her mother’s detention during the Apartheid in South Africa, and her own incarceration in Guantanamo Bay.

Also Lynda Ridley, of the Inspiring Change Project, will speak about working with Scottish prisoners putting on their own theatre productions.

Organiser Dr Claire Westall, said: “This is an exciting and unique event which draws together a number of authors whose personal and professional experience of prisons have shaped their writing careers.”

The event is at 3pm in the Berrick Saul Building, with tickets required from 5.30pm.