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Mister
What is prison really like? Is it a rest home or a savage, barbaric institution where violence reigns supreme? And what of the warders? The ‘Misters’ of the title
As Robert Allerton (co-author of THE COURAGE OF HIS CONVICTIONS) writes in his introduction:
‘MISTER is a story about men and prisons, a story that has often been told in biographies and less ambitious books with varying degrees of dishonesty and humbug. In recent years there has been a spate of such books, from both sides of the bars, all claiming to be dispassionate accounts, many of them concocted by men with only the briefest knowledge of prisons and the mentalities that govern them. Novel writers who insist on taking their readers into prison rarely go there themselves, but among the exceptions stands Michael Burgess, who qualifies, after some years as a prison officer.’
His central character is Prison Officer Paul Brandon, a tough but thoughtful man, caught up in the usual institutional web of buck-passing and lies. What happens to Brandon, his fellow warders and their charges, will shock many and create disbelief in the minds of others. This can't be so; it can't happen. But it can and does.
MISTER is documentary fiction, and the knowledge apparent on every page is gathered from the author's own experience. He has no message to put about, perhaps he is cynical, like Brandon. But he has written a novel, short and sharp like a punch in the stomach, which gives a unique account of the matter-of-fact inhumanity practised and condoned in prison by men towards their fellow beings.
As Robert Allerton (co-author of THE COURAGE OF HIS CONVICTIONS) writes in his introduction:
‘MISTER is a story about men and prisons, a story that has often been told in biographies and less ambitious books with varying degrees of dishonesty and humbug. In recent years there has been a spate of such books, from both sides of the bars, all claiming to be dispassionate accounts, many of them concocted by men with only the briefest knowledge of prisons and the mentalities that govern them. Novel writers who insist on taking their readers into prison rarely go there themselves, but among the exceptions stands Michael Burgess, who qualifies, after some years as a prison officer.’
His central character is Prison Officer Paul Brandon, a tough but thoughtful man, caught up in the usual institutional web of buck-passing and lies. What happens to Brandon, his fellow warders and their charges, will shock many and create disbelief in the minds of others. This can't be so; it can't happen. But it can and does.
MISTER is documentary fiction, and the knowledge apparent on every page is gathered from the author's own experience. He has no message to put about, perhaps he is cynical, like Brandon. But he has written a novel, short and sharp like a punch in the stomach, which gives a unique account of the matter-of-fact inhumanity practised and condoned in prison by men towards their fellow beings.
182 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1964
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July 16, 2019
Based on the cover, I thought this novel would be told from the perspective of a prisoner. It’s told from the perspective of a guard, actually. A really tough guard, who can’t stand all these bleeding-heart liberals coming into the prison system and giving prisoners whatever they want and not making them do anything they don’t want to do. This book makes The Green Mile feel like a Disney movie. It’s based on the author’s own experience as a prison guard.
This, I think, is meant as unironic praise: “...McAra talked tough as hell one minute and gave away his shirt the next. That didn’t apply to prisoners, of course. McAra was an old-time screw; an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, who, pre-Molloy, treated prisoners the way a good slave-owner did his niggers. If they worked he looked after them, if they didn’t they got bread-and-water.” And the ex-cons are supposed to love this guy, send him Christmas cards, and stop him in the street to invite him to dinner!
Maybe we’re not supposed to like the main character and the other guards (who do things like beat up a man with the mind of a five-year-old and tell him to lie about it), even though the story is told from their point of view. It’s really hard to tell, because the front-page blurb and the introduction seem to contradict the novel itself. The only reason I’m giving it two stars is because of the introduction, which I like. As Robert Allerton says, “It’s interesting to muse over what type of screw the author was.”
This is the first New Authors Limited book I've read that I’ve completely disliked.
This, I think, is meant as unironic praise: “...McAra talked tough as hell one minute and gave away his shirt the next. That didn’t apply to prisoners, of course. McAra was an old-time screw; an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth, who, pre-Molloy, treated prisoners the way a good slave-owner did his niggers. If they worked he looked after them, if they didn’t they got bread-and-water.” And the ex-cons are supposed to love this guy, send him Christmas cards, and stop him in the street to invite him to dinner!
Maybe we’re not supposed to like the main character and the other guards (who do things like beat up a man with the mind of a five-year-old and tell him to lie about it), even though the story is told from their point of view. It’s really hard to tell, because the front-page blurb and the introduction seem to contradict the novel itself. The only reason I’m giving it two stars is because of the introduction, which I like. As Robert Allerton says, “It’s interesting to muse over what type of screw the author was.”
This is the first New Authors Limited book I've read that I’ve completely disliked.
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