 you all for being here and I'll keep enjoying seeing the numbers go up and welcome to our YouTube viewers as well. And you're all here for part of our hugest campaign, which is One City, One Book, where we encourage you all to read the same book at the same time. And of course, that book is Ear Hustle. This is Ear Hustle. Unflinching stories of everyday prison life based on the famed podcast. So I hope you've all by now picked up the book, if not get it at your 28 lab patients or bookmobile, ready for you or e-book or e-audio book, all of those formats. So we're really in for a treat tonight because we are the illustrator of this is Ear Hustle, Damian Lanane. And so I just want to give a couple of quick more announcements about library news and upcoming events. And first off, a land acknowledgement, our library acknowledges that we occupy the unceded ancestral homeland of the Ramya Tusha Loni peoples, who are the original inhabitants of the San Francisco peninsula. We recognize that we benefit from working and living on their traditional homeland. As uninvited guests, we affirm their sovereign rights as first peoples and wish to pay our respects to the ancestors, elders, and relatives of the Ramya Tusha community. So this is Native American History Month. And so we have a lot of reading lists out there this month. But also there is so much going on around town, some great orgs to check into SF Heritage, who is hosting the amazing Dr. Linaida Warjack for two months. She's their artist and resident. So if you can find her, I recommend you going to hear her. She is a powerful, powerful matriarch. So check her out. And if you don't know what territory you're joining us from today, check out this worldwide map that is interactive and lets you know where you are holding space at. All right. As I said, this is one city, one book. Get the book. Here's the link to the campaign. But we are here. No, I'm going to tell you some things coming up. I almost jumped, jumped in person events. We're here. I'm here almost every night this week. So tomorrow we are showing rebound. We're going to go for a film screening. We've done a couple of them online and come back for a director talk with participants of the film as well as the filmmaker, director and producer. Thursday, the amazing Kristen Henning and to Wayne Betts will be in conversation about her book. Dr. Henning's book, The Rage of Innocence. In person, this weekend, two events. Saturday, a letter writing 101. And it'll be a queer focused with ABO comics. Check them out. They're an amazing org. The hardest working, quearest org in our town that is representing folks inside. And then also flying over walls. And they're going to talk about some letter writing 101 and the importance of letter writing. And if you follow Ear Hustle, you know, they have several episodes that talk about the importance of letter writing for folks inside. Please come to this. I want to fill the career. It's huge. I need some bodies. Come out on a Sunday Civic Center. It's also farmers market. Come at 130. I bet you'll get some good deals. So come to the farmers market and then come to the Carat. Come see Damien's artwork in the atrium. There's so much you can do as well as an exhibit on the fifth floor. And then if you've never been to the library, because people walk in, they're like, oh, I've never been here before. Get your butt to the library. Sunday, November 20th. All right. And I'm going to stop because we just have so much to do with Ear Hustle. Amazing, amazing flipping humans. So please pick up your brochure that has every event happening, the reading list, the reading guide, all things amazing in this book. Pick it up. All right. Let's get on with the show. All right. So tonight we're here to talk to Damien Lanane, who is the illustrator of This Is Ear Hustle. And he's an artist, author, scholar, librarian, PhD candidate, and formerly incarcerated. So we are in for a treat tonight. Lanane was born in Sydney, Australia. His debut novel, Sacred, was written by hand while he was in prison, serving a two year sentence for crimes, sentencing, magistrate described as vigilante action. Since his release from prison, he has become an editor of the prison magazine, paper chain, and is currently completing his PhD in law. He's also an illustrator, freelance writer, and activist for incarcerated persons. And so as I mentioned, he's also the illustrator of This Is Ear Hustle, our 17th one city one book. All right. I'm going to stop sharing and we'll be here. Hi, Damien. And also, audience, this is going to be like a free for all conversation. Please either use the Q&A, throw your questions in, throw them in the chat, and we're going to kind of go that route. I have some questions, but please, Damien, open us up. Yeah. So thanks for having me, everyone. So I'm zooming in from Newcastle, Australia. For those of you who don't know Australia very well, Newcastle is a couple of hours north of Sydney in the state of New South Wales, which Sydney is the capital of. And this is a warbicle land, the traditional land of the warbicle people. Sovereign Tree was never seeded in Australia. So yeah, this is still Aboriginal land. And I like to acknowledge that because Indigenous Australians are actually the most incarcerated people on the entire planet. They make up 3% of the Australian population and about 25% of the prison population. And there isn't a disproportionate, you know, centered interest in people like that, quite that high anywhere else on the planet there where we have a real problem with that in this country, unfortunately, which the government needs to address. But moving along, yeah, so I'm here to, yeah, just talk about, well, answer whatever questions you have. So I've got lots of talking points, but let me know how you want to start. Yeah. All right. That sounds great. So I think we'll just jump in. And like I said, folks who are here, please feel free to add to the chat. I'm keeping an eye on the Q&A, but if you want to jump it in, please do as well as our viewers on YouTube. If you see me doing this, I'm just looking at YouTube. So I'm going to start with the obvious, which is how was your, please describe your journey with ear hustle and how that came to be. And then how, I mean, I want to know like how more logistically, like how did they decide which drawings to do all of that? And then did you do like hundreds more that we're not seeing? Right. And yeah, so fair enough. So I guess I'll, if you want to come back to how I taught myself to draw like that, that we'll come back to that. But so I was, became an artist in prison. I'd never done art before, not since primary school at least, and elementary school, I think you call it. But I taught myself inside. And then after I got out, my art was a bit generic at first, but then it started taking a focus on the criminal justice system. And so my third art exhibition, my third solo one was held at a place called Wolves End in Australia. And my theme, the title that was broken chains. And my theme was people who made the most of their time in prison. So I drew Nelson Mandela, Malcolm X. And at that stage, I was one of my best friends. She put me on to, she's like, Damien, you're a former prison, you got to check out this podcast. And I think there were like three seasons into E-Hustle then. And and, you know, I think I binged three seasons in like a week and a half or something. It was ridiculous. And, and so I, one of the people I drew for my exhibition was, was Earl on Woods. And I, as I normally do, if the person I'm drawing is, you know, on Instagram, I always tag them in it. And you know, sometimes I was hoping like the best case scenario, who'll like and comment, and that'll make my day. And, but he did. And then he sent me a message as well, something along the line was like, you know, this is really great. We've been looking for someone, someone will be in touch. And I was like, I'm like, oh, at the time I was like, I was, I was doing my master's, I think I almost finished my master's degree, but I was still a master's degree student. And I was like flat broke. And I, and I remember I got that email, I'm like, oh, maybe, maybe someone in his family wants to order a portrait, maybe I'm going to make $300. This wouldn't that be incredible. And then the next day, I got an email from Penguin Random House, offering me the contract to illustrate the book, which was, well, actually, the first thing they did was they said, oh, yeah, we're interested in, you know, having you illustrate this, but I've gone through your like Instagram. And I love drawing faces. I love putting expression in the thing, like, like capturing the expression in people's faces. So I, I don't normally do still life because I find it a little bit boring. But um, yeah, that's it. Yeah, fair enough. So but yeah, they said, oh, we haven't drawn, can you do still life as well? And I said, sure. Because I mean, I knew I could, I just didn't have any, any experience. So I, they're like, we need things like a cigarette lighter. So that night I got a cigarette lighter. And I'm, and I actually spent about like six hours drawing that. I'm like, oh, God, I got to get, I got to get this contract. And so I put so much effort into that. And then I, like, you know, I was like, oh, you know, I whipped this up together tonight, you know, just like, you know, as if it was no big deal. It wasn't squalling over my desk all night, but I sent them that. And then I think that kind of sealed the deal because that picture will be in there somewhere. I think that's a great lighter. But yeah, that turned out very well. And yeah, from there, I'll go on. That's really interesting. I was just going to tell folks that these are some of the illustrations from the book that Damien is just now talking about. Yeah. And so from there, I was a bit of a waiting period that they, they were still deciding what images they wanted. And so I got, I got sent through some sample images to draw through and also just some instructions. I thought I'd get ahead of myself. I thought maybe they'd be able to draw, use that lighter as like, I actually said, you can have this for free as image one, but turns out they needed that wizard lighter that's on the screen right now. They needed a specific lighter with like a faded, you know, Zippo with a faded, you know, wizard on it. And, but yeah, so there was a lot of about probably like half of it was, I get given a reference image. And then the other half, I was like told what to draw. Like we, like one with it was, and the funny thing was, I didn't have any idea, like much idea what the drawings were about when I was just told like, oh, we need a picture of like some band sneakers. And so I drew that. And that was actually the one on the screen right now that that's actually the second one I did. Because the first one I did, they were like, like, I just got a picture of I needed a reference images for a check advance sneakers. So I just, I just Googled it. And then I draw the first one that came out, which was like an advertisement. And then they were like, Oh, look, this is really great. But we actually needed them to look really rough and a little bit rough and old. And so, so then I'm like, where am I going to get a reference image for that? So actually, I got that reference image off eBay, someone who was selling this second hand sneakers, and they weren't actually that scuffed up like the scuffs in the on the inside. And, and so I like added some more scuffs. Yeah, there was a little bit of creativity with some of the reference images. But I didn't like, I think 90% of the reference, the initial, they wanted them concept sketches. And so I like 90% of the concept sketches I came up with were accepted. There we are. There was only a few they asked me to change tricks. And like, it was just like a little bit of not upset at all, but a little bit of miscommunication. For example, yeah, they didn't tell me the shoes were supposed to be scuffed. And then they said they wanted a picture of Nigel as a child staring at a mouse hole. And so in my head, I've got, yes, that's the one that I ended up using. In my head, I was like, I was thinking like a Tom and Jerry mouse hole, like in a cartoon. And so I actually, I came up with this concept sketch and I was, I worked on it like all day. I was so happy with it. And it was like, it was from inside the mouse hole, looking out at a little girl like peering in. And I was like, oh, this is like, I've done myself, this is great. And then I sent it to them and they're like, we're really sorry, we should have specified it was a mouse hole outside in the dirt. I'm like, ah, you know, that was probably the only thing that I was like mildly. It was fine. But yeah, like the amazing glooper reels. Then yeah, wow. That's really wild because these pictures are so associated to the story. Then you have just such a complete random view of what the story is. Have you gotten through the book? Yeah, no, actually, it's funny. It took me a while to get the book because I it came out and the publishing company said they'd send me a free author illustrator copy rather. And it did just like probably got lost in the mail. This is like COVID and stuff. And then it didn't turn up. So then I ordered a copy from Amazon. And then like two months later, I got an email from Amazon. They're like, oh, we're sorry, your copy got lost in the mail. Here's a refund. And then I was like, oh, and then I went to the local bookstore. It hasn't been actually specifically released in Australia or it hadn't been last time I checked. And so they couldn't get it any faster than Amazon. So I ended up order it from Amazon again. So I actually got the book like four months after it came out. And then I sat down and I read it all in like one sitting. And I was like, oh, that's why they wanted a drawing of a rowboat because they just told me to draw a rowboat any rowboat. They didn't give me a reference image for that, which was fine, you know, I didn't know. And but then I was like, I'm like, oh, that's why I was drawing that. That's a little surreal. But I love it. That's amazing. Do you want to say anything else about your partnership within how this came? I mean, that's like, wow, right? It was like, oh, it was kind of like, it felt really surreal because you know, I was like the biggest fan of the podcast. And the next thing I know, I'm a part of it. And it was really great on so many levels because I'm at the time, oh, it was, we just gone into lockdown over here. And so I kind of like lost my job by default. And so then I was like, I had all this work and which was great. And also, you know, I had been getting, you know, I get a lot of likes on for my artwork on Instagram, Instagram handles at embers of retribution. But I likes don't pay the bills, you know, like, you know, it's like, you know, sometimes you get a thousand likes and like, that's great. But you know, my artwork wasn't making any money. So yeah, that was like my my big break. As an artist, because, you know, I everyone loved the work. But I mean, you know, I feel like success is like, you know, 40% skill and 60% luck. And I definitely feel like that's something that happened. You know, I tagged the right person at the right time. But I mean, that was also a consequence of I'm always putting my art out where I'm always trying to do interviews, you know, you have to unfortunately self promote to to get anywhere. But I'm just seeing a question in the the chat. What medium do I work with the most? And so it's all pencils on paper, just graphite pencils. That's what I taught myself with in prison, because that's all I had access to. There was only graphite pencil. There was a packet like 12 like kids drawing color pencils. But I mean, you can't do like realism with with 12 shades of color. So yeah, I taught myself a just graphite on paper. And I've really stuck with that because I love it. I mean, people keeps asking like, have you ever painted? And yeah, fun fact, I'm a published illustrator. Now I've had six solo art exhibitions. I have never attempted to paint. Like, again, not since, you know, early childhood. I've actually, you know, I had a friend recently bought me a big painting set. She's like, give it a go. And I do want to but I'm a I'm very busy and be I'm not bored with pencils yet. I do want to branch out. I want to get into digital art as well. But I'm just so happy with what I'm what I'm doing at the moment. And I've also just been hired for a big exhibition here in Newcastle, Australia, that's going up next March. So I don't think I'll be teaching myself anything before those works are finished. Beautiful. Let's see. Chad has a question. Do any of the stories reflect your experience in Australian jails? Are the prison systems and culture of the US slash Australia overlapping? There was like, you know, listening to the podcast, there's definitely things I identify with. I'm like, I remember exactly what that was. I just actually, I will probably get into this later. But I I now run the prison magazine, Paper Chained. And I just interviewed Nigel and Erlon for issue eight, which just released today, actually, you can see it on the website paperchain.com. But something I said to them was like, I love the prison that they had an episode about like, like, like a prison made sex toy in this in America is called a fee fee. And they call it that over here too. And I told them that you might be interested to know what's called that in Australia as well. And they're like, where the hell did that term come from? Well, I got no idea. But there are lots of things that are very similar. But there are also things that are that are completely different. For example, like, like segregating people by race. Like, I was listening into that episode. And I was like, Oh, my God, this is like nothing I've ever heard about. Like, you know, by all means, you know, like different races will like naturally hang out together. But you know, you can congregate. And you know, it's if an Asian person gets in a fight with an Arabic person, that doesn't mean they all have to go in and like I didn't have a gang thing, you know, it's like, yeah, like that we don't have any of that, like really high racial tension. Well, the jails don't segregate people by race either. So that was something that was completely new. Our prison system, like per capita, it's actually growing disturbingly fast. But you know, we've only got like, like 44,000 people in prison in Australia out of a population of like 25 million or something, which is kind of like, it's growing disproportionately fast. But you know, in terms of like other first world nations, we're kind of on par with everyone except America, which is like seven times above everyone else, you've got the highest incarceration rate in the world. So something I found is that the silver lining with having such a like a massively incarcerated portion of society is that there are really great programs and services for American in American prisons. We don't really have that in Australia, like if you want to do your like high school equivalency, the Plain Ministry, good luck with that in prison, you know, there's no like there's mandatory GED programs in America in Australia, like I actually talked to someone who spent four years lobbying, trying to move around the prison system to get to a prison, there's only like one in New South Wales that you know, you could you could study, you could do your high school equivalency at like of the, I think we've got 37 jails in this in this state. And I think at the time, only one offered them. And now I think like even five years later, only four prisons like offer high school equivalency programs. So like, you know, we have really bad programs in here, which is again, why I taught myself to draw because there was nothing else to do. So I mean, there are definitely a lot of most of it's I could comparable, but yeah, there's definitely some things that are uniquely American like such like how huge your prison population is and the race racial segregation is the first thing that comes to mind as well. Interesting. Tell us about paper change. Yeah, so I went into prison and yeah, I found out quickly that there was a long story short, no education, no rehabilitation, no therapy. And so I'm like, and I started panicking because my friends had asked me while I was on bail that like, are you afraid to go to prison? And to be honest, I wasn't because I, you know, I died a very traumatic childhood. I'd also spent five years in the military military. So like in terms of like, like, you know, rough things in my life going to prison, you know, unfortunately, wasn't wasn't all that bad. So I wasn't afraid until I went in. And I realized there was nothing for me to do because I've always kept really busy. Like I was working three jobs and finishing an undergraduate degree before I went in. And so I went in and I found out there's nothing to do. And I spent the first half of my sentence, writing a crime novel. It's called Skard. And it's actually got picked up by a small publisher in Seattle of all places. But yes, that's it there. And but I finished that after five months. And after five months, after that, I didn't know what to do because I didn't have an idea for a second book. And so, you know, a friend gave me this suggestion, like, why, why don't you give drawing ago, like art keep you busy. And yeah, I picked him up on that offer. And I've completely side by track myself. What was the original question again? Paper chain, paper chain. Oh, yes, paper chain. And so but I was I was making all this writing and art. So in addition to the novel, I did write a couple of short stories. And I was also yet then I was teaching myself to draw. And so I had all this art and writing and I was just gathering in a box under my bed because I asked around. And again, having a very small prison population in Australia, there was no prison magazine at the time. Like I asked around like I asked people like, like, is there a prison magazine we can send out art to and people looked at me like I'd ask them if we could bring up an order pizza, you know, they're like, what are you talking about this? And also I resolved, I'm like, you know what, this is this is a real shame that that's the this could be such a great creative outlet for people because you know, people have got like bottled up trauma and they need a way to release it and just get that out in a constructive manner. And so I'm like, I'm going to set up a prison newsletter when I when I get out. And thankfully, you know, when I got out, I had to rebuild my life. And I'm actually very grateful that somebody else beat me to it just by about two months, and that they started paper chained. And it was started by one woman, her brother was in prison. But I saw like it started up. And I got in touch. And I was like, Oh, this is exactly what I wanted to do. Would you like some content from me? And she's like, Yes, I'm struggling to find content. So for the first five years, she just released that annually. And I was kind of like the only person helping her with it, like peripherally. And at the end of those five years, she said she reached out to me, and she said, Damien, I am, you know, I have a family now. You know, I've been paying for this all myself. I can't afford it anymore. You're the only person who's been there from day one. Is there any chance you want to keep this alive? Yeah, no pressure. And I was like, I don't have the time or the money for it either. But I knew how much difference something like this makes to people in prison. And I mean, I get mail every day, like he sees one today, like, for people like telling me how much difference the magazine makes to their life in prison. And so I decided to talk that over. So the first four issues down the bottom, that's from her, they were annual, and I took over from issue five, which came out in January last year. And after that, I was able to secure funding. So I've actually created a job for myself. And actually because of E-Hussell. So I got the contract to illustrate the book for E-Hussell. And I had the art exhibition for that at a gallery called Boomgate Gallery that said in Sydney at a very notorious prison called Long Bay. That's probably like the hardest prison in Australia. And they've got a art gallery out the front of the prison that only shows artwork from current and formerly incarcerated prisoners. And I had my art exhibition for this is E-Hussell there, the first one. And I didn't know, but the commissioner of and the assistant commissioner of Corrective Services in Australia, they in New South Wales, they came to that art exhibition. And I actually said to them, I'm like, look, I make this prison magazine. And I said, I posted into inmates and like maybe a third of the prisons just reject it without telling me why is there anything you can do to help get this approved. And they actually said, well, we've just, we've just got a tablet system for inmates where that came in because of COVID, you know, they had to ban visits. And so they gave everyone tablets to have video visits and said, and they're like, would you like us to make this available on the tablets? And I said, well, yes, that's brilliant. And then I was like, wait a minute, you know, my circulation was about 200 people. And I was struggling to find the time to do that myself. And now my circulation just went from 200 to 12,000 overnight. That's the prison population in this state. And so long story short, I applied for some funding and I got a contract to make the magazine part time. So not only did I get a, yeah, I, this is all from tagging Erlon in that picture. Yeah, I tagged him in the picture. I got the contract to illustrate the book. I had an art exhibition for the book. I met the commissioner of, you know, prison system. And he made this magazine available on the tablet system, which means I needed funding and then I got the funding. And so now I've created a job which is all traced back to this one picture I drew of Erlon. So yes, thanks to E-Hustle. I'm employed now, you know. That's amazing. So the content of the paper chain, is that also from folks inside? Yes. So it's like almost entirely from people, incarcerated people, and we get contributions from the US as well. Actually, one of our regular contributors is on death row at San Quentin. But yeah, it's mostly poetry and art. But I mean, I also do create content that I think people in custody will enjoy. For example, yeah, I've got the, in this issue, not only do I have the interview with Nigel and Erlon, I've asked for permission to reprint the transcript of the first episode of E-Hustle so that people inside could have a look. And but yeah, so it's mostly from people who are incarcerated and just some things I add in myself that I think that will interest people like trying to do interviews. I've lined up, those are the two people that helped me. I've got an associate editor and someone does the graphic design issue five, which I put together myself. It's great, but it looks like I made it myself in Microsoft Word because I did. So, you know, so it's actually looking like a real magazine now, which I'm really happy about. Yeah. Yeah, it looks really beautiful, Damien. And so this is like, yeah, this is an inmate in Western Australia who makes custom cigarette lighters. It's actually funny. We've got six states in Australia and two internal territories and Western Australia is the only one that still allows prisoners to have cigarettes. So I actually had to put a disclaimer there saying that, you know, that's not illegal where that photo was taken, you know, and that's from a guy in Texas, those ones and those cartoons. Yeah. But yeah, these are all from Australian people, these drawings here. Yeah. Wow. Wouldn't it be interesting if you could somehow, I don't know, maybe you are, are you able to pay folks for their content they provide? Wouldn't that be like amazing? I'd love to. I've got a lot of ideas for expanding the magazine and I'd love to like run a contest. I got funding from a not-for-profit to hire me to create this and I haven't really pressed them for like the funding for a competition and stuff as well. Also, I'm not really sure how, like, logistically we could get approval to actually give people in prison money. But I mean, I'd love to do that at some point. Yeah, at this stage where we're just accepting the content and but because we can't pay people for them, we let, well, we don't want it anyway, but like, we let people retain the copyright. So like, we actually have a disclaimer like, you know, you used to learn the work. We're just publishing it and promoting it for you. Do you know of the history of like prison journalism in Australia? Yes. Actually, this is something because I got out and I was like, I was inside. I'm like, there's somebody has to have made a prison magazine of some kind because I talked to guys who'd been fit in for years and no one had ever heard of one. And then starting in issue six with a guy with the Indigenous man with the telephone there, I actually I decided to start researching the history of prison magazines in Australia. And I'm the only person who I think who's ever done that because so I went to like every state library and I and the National Library and I reached out to some personal contacts. And there's an article in here called the history of Australian prison newsletters. And I'm I actually tracked down the first Australian prison newsletter which came out in 1912 and it actually ran till 1945. But then I found that there's been I found, I think I want to say at last count 45 different prison magazines that have run at some point in Australia's history. A lot of them are really a lot of prison journals everywhere are really ephemeral because you know, they get shut down because they they say say something outspoken or the person who was making it gets released. So a lot of them only survive for two or three issues. But I found like there were a couple that there was one that went for 20 years before it was banned in 2002, I believe. And that was like the last nationwide prison magazine we had for general population inmates, there was one there were one started up again. Well, two started up just like around the time I got out. One's just aimed at LGBT inmates and then paper chain was aimed at everyone. But yeah, between 2002 and 2016, there was no nationwide prison magazine anywhere in the country. And now now we've got two of them, which is which I think is great. Yeah. Are there any women contributors? Yes. And so something that's consistent around the world is that women only make up like less than 10% of prisoners like wherever you go really like. So like in Australia that's the same like women make up about 8% of people in prison. But there's a disproportionately high amount of contributions from female inmates. Although these are great. Those are like this guy in New Zealand actually carved these motorbikes just with matchsticks and sandpaper. But yeah, the creativity of some people is incredible. That's what a comment just there's a comment in the Q&A that says, when their dad was serving a life sentence in prison, he would commission gifts and drawings for our birthdays. Beautifully intricate jewelry boxes made entirely from cardboard. It's amazing what what folks can create with limited resources. Yes. I think this is an example of that for sure. Definitely. That's so intricate. I have noticed that we get a like so 8% of people in Australia are women in prisons. And but we get like probably about a like a quarter of the contributions are from women. And I think that's because women are much more open about sharing their feelings and things in general. But I have noticed we get a I mean, still it's like much less than half. But by per capita, like we get a very high amount of contributions from people in prison. And as you can see on the screen now, that that's the ballot of Reading Jail, which Oscar Wild wrote. So I like to share that like historical things that people have written in prison as well. It makes people feel like really not alone that to know that like someone else has gone through what they're going through. So that was I was that actually made a lot of that was really inspiring for me. The two most inspiring things I read in prison were the autobiography of Malcolm X and the ballot of Reading Jail by Oscar Wild. So I mean, I when I talk over the magazine, I'm like, I have to share that so that other people can read it as well. But I'm just writing that down so we can put in the document. I just there's a question on the webinar now. One thing I found is that the E-Hussell podcast really humanizes prisoners whom society has somewhat discarded. Is there a parallel to life without parole in Australia? I'll answer that question. And I'm like, that's something I like, you know, I found fascinating and horrifying. Like actually, before I got involved with E-Hussell personally, I remember there was that episode eight left behind really stuck stuck with me on that was the one where they had Curtis Roberts. And he got life imprisonment. He got 51 years to life for stealing 220 notes from a cash register that was open. And I was blown away by that. I actually got in touch with Curtis like he got out and I and I actually helped promote a fundraiser for him. And I talked to him a bit and I was like, you know, we don't have we don't have anything like that in Australia. It's really uncommon to get life in prison in Australia. Like, yeah, like it for cold blooded first degree murder of an adult, you know, you'd probably get 25 years. But it's like, you'd have to do something like incredibly heinous, like murder, like, like, you know, a small family of children to get life in prison in Australia. Like it's really uncommon. So like I hear about how many people just get life on the three strikes in the US. And I'm like, this is crazy. You know, like Erlon, I mean, granted, you know, he's doing the wrong thing at the time. But like, you know, like 31 years to life for attempted robbery. And he didn't even know he was a three striker because these first two convictions were as a juvenile, like this, that's that's crazy. So sentences are a lot shorter over here. In a case in point, probably myself. It's great. You can just see on the screen the Erlons, you know, like, you know, put a lot of emojis in as a response for that. Yeah. And I was on the Erlon at the top two comments. That's that's funny. But yeah, so you sentences are typically shorter here. Example. So people ask me what I did. It's not a secret. Someone very close to me at the time told me that she was sexually assaulted and that being provided with that unintentionally retraumatized me. It brought up a lot of memories, bad memories from my childhood. And I pretty much had a nervous breakdown and I went to attack him. He wasn't home. But I was there and I was angry and I had a cigarette lighter on me. So I set fire to his house. The whole place burned down. Nobody was injured. But you know, I, I caused $310,000 with damage. And yeah, I was I was expecting to get about three years. But they told me I there was extenuating serpents circumstance and stuff. So I was only actually in there for 10 months. But you know, like, if I had done that in the US, I'm pretty sure I'd still be in jail. You know, our sentences are much shorter here. And yeah, so life without parole is very uncommon. And but I mean, I do see I like to think we're humanizing people through paper changes, which is the second comment here in the chat in that a like, I mean, my key my key audience is people who are incarcerated. It's a you know, it's magazine for incarcerated people. But you know, I make it freely available on the website. And I'd like to think it does humanize people. I'd like to think that that's that's the effect it has. But I mean, most of the feedback I get is from people in prison, really. So yeah, like, we don't I don't get a lot of like comments from the general public, but that that's fine. So how exciting is it that you're in a library? Yeah, well, I mean, so I was, you know, the novel like my novel was already like published. So I so but it's just great to have like, you know, see see my name on it as well. It's rock star level for the librarians around us. We talk a little bit about like your your experience in working library and you became yes, when you got out, we all want to hear that. Your current study. Yeah. So I I had, I just finished an undergraduate degree in psychology before I went in and about halfway through that, I actually realized I'm like, I don't want a I don't want a career in this. But I didn't want to drop out because you know, as I had nothing better to do and I'm too stubborn to quit anything. But towards the end of my degree, I was starting to think I wanted to work in libraries because I've always just been passionate about reading and and also preserving history like nerdy secret. My my big hobby is I I I write for Wikipedia. I'm actually ranked in the top, you know, 1500 editors on Wikipedia by edit count. And so I was starting to lean towards that. And then I went in and actually made me a library assistant was my first job in prison. And and that was that was funny, like prison kind of sort of like, yes, I actually do like really like working in a library. And so pretty much the first thing I did when I got out was I I enrolled in my master's in information studies or it's called library science in some countries. And I yes, I did that part time for four years. And then I worked as a librarian for two years. And then kind of COVID happened. And also then, yeah, the I was working for a not for profit. And and they ran out of funding. And as you as you know, when they said like our librarians tend to tend to nest, you know, they they get a job and they stay there. And so like the only way like a new librarian job opens up is if if somebody like, yeah, yeah. And so I remember I went out to lunch with a friend of mine, who just so happens to be professor of law. And I just you know, they just ran out of funding for my job as a librarian. And I said, like, what am I going to do now, you know, I've always wanted to do research in the criminal justice system because of what I saw there. But you know, I don't have a law degree. And so what I have to start back at law school, and she's and she said, Oh, we've actually just started advertising a PhD in the School of Law. And, you know, it's sure help, but you wouldn't actually need a undergraduate law degree to do this, this study, you know, your lived experience would, you know, be combined with your masters would be more than enough. And so I'm, you know, I applied for that. And I pretty much got it straight away. And then I like I turned up at law school like four weeks later, like, how the hell did I get here? You know, like six weeks ago, I was working in a library and now I'm at law school. So it's a United Nations funded scholarship to improve the rights of people with disabilities when impacted by the criminal justice system. And that has a lot to do with my experience as well, because I've been diagnosed with autism. And I actually went through a period of depression in prison and the healthcare in prison is very bad in pretty much everywhere you go. But yeah, there's no funding for therapy in prison in Australia at all. So the first thing I'm trying to do at the moment with my PhD is so we have universal healthcare in Australia, which is very good. But you know, our health care is kind of like the envy of the world, but the only people in all of Australia who don't have access to it are people in prison. And so my mother the current focus of my PhD is to try and make that available. And I've actually organized a conference in Sydney on the 5th of December to move forward with lobbying for this. And but yeah, so my my focus at the moment is trying to get improved healthcare in prison. I'm going to stop sharing for a moment and see some of these questions. How many incarcerated folks participate in paper chain? And do you know if there's any other topics that folks are interested in, both in participating and hoping to see? It's probably hard to say exactly how many people are on because, you know, we go out on the tablet system. So we reached several thousand inmates. I've asked corrective services if they can give me like statistics on how like, you know, how much is read and that they haven't provided me with any of those yet. There's definitely like, you know, we've had we've had, you know, at least a couple hundred people write in and contribute something. And, you know, every now and then somebody throws me a curveball and like, like somebody wrote in the like, oh, you know, everybody else is submitting poetry, can I submit some song lyrics? And I was like, yeah, sure. And then I'm just yesterday, well, a few weeks ago, somebody said, I don't know how they got permission for this, but they got permission to do crochet work in prison. And they like, I'm like, is that something you'd published? I'm like, yes, anything creative that you can make will publish it. So he actually, it's very difficult to take photos in prison. So we had to like, send something to his family and then his family took a photo of it. And that's going to be an issue nine, which will come out in March, we're quarterly at the moment. And so we definitely get a few like questions from people like, you know, will you accept this? And I keep trying to tell people like, you know, if you can create it, I will accept it. Like, you know, some guy actually wrote in, I've got these on my desk now, he sent me a whole bunch of like, you know, origami. And he said, and I was like, that's a great idea. In fact, if you want to write back it with your origami instructions, I'd love to share that. So I mean, it's only really limited by I love it when we get suggestions. So like people can you can you can you include this in the next issue, like, you know, puzzles and just little things like that. But yeah, like, I'm basically anything that people ask for that, you know, isn't going to cause any trouble. I definitely like to include. Yeah. Are you still doing your print circulation of it? Yes. So we still so it's only that one state in Australia that has the tablets. So I mean, we still have a printed circulation. And also, you know, we don't have a lot of oversight C subscribers. I am, I accept overseas subscribers. But I try not to like, advertise it because, you know, it costs me $2 to post it to someone in Australia and like 13 to send it to someone in the US. And we only have limited funding. But I mean, like I do very much encourage, you know, you can print it for free on the website. So I try to like encourage people like you can print it yourself and post it into to to anyone incarcerated, you know, but yeah, we do get and I don't know how some people even found it. You know, I get I got a letter from Pittsburgh yesterday. So someone in prison there and people just find out about it. And so I've had contributors from at this stage. It's overwhelming Australian, but also New Zealand, UK and the US. Yeah. Love that. All right, let's see. You said subscribers are focused in the prison population. If you had one person or group you wish you would you wish would subscribe to your publication, who or which group would that be? Yeah, good question. We do have like, like I said, but there's a high proportion of like, like women and also like LGBT people. We get good contributions from them. I don't know why, but we don't get a lot of contributions from First Nations people. And I'm not really sure why that is. We definitely try to make them feel as encouraged as possible. But I would like to hear more from our indigenous Australians, especially because of how disproportionately impacted by the prison system they are. I do wish we had we get like, people love to express themselves through poetry. I wish there were like, there was a little bit more variety. Like, you know, I wish that, you know, we got more like, like fiction, because that's what I made when I was in prison. You know, I wrote a crime novel, and I wrote short stories as well. And so like every time I get like a piece of fiction, it's like, I'm lucky day, you know. But yeah, in terms of like, individual people, probably just indigenous Australians, I do like hearing from, you know, the stories are very sad, but also people with disabilities in prison, people whose voices really need to be heard, you know, they're marginalized in two ways. And so I mean, yeah, that's I do always like to hear from them. And I'd like to hear hear more because they probably feel like they have a less vocal voice than anyone else really. Yeah, I'm sure. I was going to ask about the the youth at like, what age do folks start going to prison in Australia? Because in America, though, that was so like, just humongously heartbreaking. So many people were like, babies going into prison. And of course, like having no, no other knowledge of what life was about, other than being a child. This is something, you know, I'm quite ashamed about, you know, being Australian is that we have actually have one of the lowest incarceration ages in the world. And so Australia in the UK still send 10 year olds to prison. So 10 is the age of criminal responsibility here, which is just dreadful. A friend of mine, Kenan Mundine, he Indigenous Australian former prisoner, and he actually got invited to the United Nations to speak about a race in the age. Yeah, it's like your hashtag raise the age in Australia. It's been the last couple of years, it's gotten a lot of steam. The one of our internal territories has agreed to do it themselves. And I believe a second one has now as well. But like, yes, prisons are a state issue over here, like every, we've got eight different prison systems, each state and territory runs their own show. And so a couple of them have agreed to raise it to 12 now, which is still probably too low. But yeah, that's it's 10. And unfortunately, that's a really huge problem because I mean, you know, a 10 year old, literally stealing food doesn't need prison, they're hungry, you know, and it's just, but you know, that's that's that that's the problem with with tough on crime, it just creates more crime, you know. Yeah. There's a question in the chat now. You really had no formal training before prison. Did you get any formal training? No, I am, I so like I said to my friend, I came out of my cell and into the common area in the morning. And my friend is like, you look down, I'm like, yeah, I finished my novel last night. And he's like, isn't that a good thing? I'm like, well, yeah, but what am I going to do now? And he said, well, why don't you give drawing ago? And I'm pretty sure he was just trying to like, you know, he did something, he do something go away. And but I sat down and don't get me wrong, there are plenty of things I've tried in my life that I've been absolutely terrible at, you know, a while back a friend asked me, he's like, Damian, you're tall, you're fit, join my basketball team, you'll be greater than I was the worst player on the team. Right. You know, it was, it was embarrassing. But I mean, drawing is the exact opposite. I started drawing and I'm like, and my friend was like, I thought you said you never drawn before. And I'm like, well, I've never tried, this is easy. I think it's an autism thing. Like I see what's there and I copy it. So yeah, my art's very good, but it also is like, you know, I work from reference images. So yeah, I don't really understand how people do abstract art. I can only like, kind of work with what's in front of me. But I started drawing and, you know, and I was trying to smudge, you know, to shade in and I was just teaching myself and I was there and I'm using my finger and I'm trying to smudge it in. And another like prisoner walk past me and I knew he do some drawing and he's like, it's like, I don't do that. You use a Q tip. And so then I, then I was like, this is way better. And then I was on the outside and I was still using Q tips to smudge. And then I had a friend over at my house and he's like, dude, there's actually a thing called a paper stump. And I'm like, and I'm like, because I just got used to doing it the prison way. And he's like, and I'm like, what do you know, there's, yeah, there's a, I've got, yeah, I got one of them here, you know, it's just like, you know, a little like, um, especially made a piece of paper that's wound up really tight. I'm like, oh, my God, this is way better than using a Q tip. You know, and so, and then I did a time lapse drawing a while ago. And a friend of mine went to art school. She was, I did the time lapse of this photo realistic drawing. And she said, this is great. And the thing I love most about it is this is not how you're supposed to draw. And I'm like, I don't know how you're supposed to draw. This is just how I taught myself. So, yeah, there was no training. I am the novel I had a little bit of like, you know, I, I, there was a book in prison. They had that on writing by Stephen King. I actually got my auntie to post it in. And, and so like, I got some like, you know, a good advice on how to write from that book. But, uh, yeah, drawing was, um, aside from, you know, that, that guy giving me the jail hack and, you know, a couple of, you know, a couple of people giving me pointers. No, it was all self taught. And, uh, yeah, I, yeah, I, it was kind of funny, like the things I, um, the ways to make my drawing a lot easier once I actually got out, like, oh, this is, um, this is way better. You know, yeah. Yes. Stephen, a message in the tap, uh, chat, you know, Stephen King how to write book is like, I mean, it's so millions. It's like beyond. Yeah. I, I, I actually get a lot of people. Um, a lot of, um, a common thing I get from mail from people in prison is, um, they're like, uh, you wrote a book in prison. You've motivated me to do that. Like any advice. And I'm like, first piece of advice is if you can get on writing by Stephen King, that's the only book you need. Uh, but you know, chances are their library doesn't have it. So, and then I'm like, well, here's a few pointers to keep you going in the meantime. But yeah, that that's what I'd say to anyone inside or out just, um, that that's, that's the, uh, you know, if you only have one book and I think that's the only one you need anyway. Yeah. What were the libraries like in prison? Um, really bad. Um, so I, I mean, I, as a person who's a librarian now, like ethically, I don't think you can call them a library. I'd call it a, like a room with like six shelves of books. And, um, and so yeah, they, and oh, here's a fun fact. And, um, we had a, the prison I did most of my time at, um, there was an encyclopedia set in the prison and it was printed in 1964. And there's been a few developments since 1964. So I actually wrote an angry letter to the minister for corrections in this country. And, um, he, um, I said, look, this isn't like these libraries are terrible. Here's an example of how they're terrible. And he wrote back and he said, you know, we're sending you a new encyclopedia set. And I'm like, well, small victory. That that's great. It doesn't address the, um, overall issue that the library is terrible. And, um, not a single, I actually have a friend who did, uh, she did a PhD in prison libraries in Australia. If you want to look it up, Jane Garner is her name. Um, and, um, yeah. So she, she literally pretty much wrote the book on prison libraries in Australia. And, um, yeah, uh, when she did that, which was only like three or four years ago, like there wasn't a single prison in Australia that actually hired a librarian librarian, like kind of falls under the generic duties of the educational department. So yeah, that present, yeah. Uh, so the libraries are pretty, um, terrible. And also there's no library and, um, most of them are actually run by inmates. So the education high as a inmate who, to, to put the, you know, the books back on shelves. Um, question in the chat. Um, how did I publish? I, um, no, I didn't self publish. I, um, I found a very small, uh, traditional publisher in the, in the, in Seattle, they're called 10th Street Press. Um, I, there aren't a lot of publishers in Australia and I made some mistakes when I first started. Um, I didn't realize that when you send, um, your draft manuscript to a publisher, um, if they reject it once, they'll never look at it again. It doesn't matter how much you write, rewrite it. And so, but I didn't know that. So as soon as I got out of prison, I just sent my draft to everyone. And then I kind of shafted myself from the only, you know, um, there was only 10 publishers in Australia to begin with. And then, so then I started branching out overseas and I found, um, very small publisher, but I mean that, you know, I'm happy with, um, you know, uh, just happy somebody picked it up really here. That's really cool. Um, next question is, um, what do you plan to do with the PhD in law? Uh, teach, um, very good question. Um, people keep asking me that all the time. And even my supervisor said, you know, I think you'd be a great teacher. And I'm like, teaching falls within the bell curve of what I'd like to do. But I mean, I'm, um, so I went in and I was very depressed in prison and I said, um, look, um, so outside, um, yeah, like I said, we've got universal healthcare on the outside here. Um, you can actually get free, uh, free, um, counseling sessions with a psychologist. Everyone in Australia is entitled to free counseling sessions, except people in prison. So I was getting free counseling while I was on bail. And then my counseling ended as soon as I went in and I was like, this is, um, you know, this is ridiculous. I'm really the people who need, um, mental health treatment the most are the only people that don't have access to it. And so I was really hell bent on like, you know, trying to do something about that. And so, um, uh, then I got this PhD and, um, yes, everyone keeps asking me, what do you want to do with the PhD? I'm like, honestly, I want to improve healthcare in prison. You know, I, um, I'm only employed part time for paper chain because that's all the funding they have. Like, I ideally just like to make the magazine full time. But, um, so I mean, I'll probably go, you know, be, uh, finish the PhD, um, get myself a fancy title and then go back to making the magazine. You know, but I, I don't, um, I don't really plan things that far anymore because, you know, if you had a told me like eight years ago, um, I was miserable before I went to prison. You know, I hated being in the army. I was attracted to the army because I had childhood trauma and I thought I'd, like, I'd feel protected in there. And it just, uh, it was lots of angry people in the army. It just, um, made things worse. And, um, and so I was, I was in a very dysfunctional relationship. I had an unhealthy attitude to relationships and I was, I was in this job, I hated. And if you had a told me like eight years ago that, you know, um, you'll be a published novelist, you'll be a published illustrator and you'll be doing a PhD in law. I would have, yeah, I thought you were nuts. So I mean, um, I don't have any specific plans for the PhD in itself. Um, I, I, um, I'm kind of leaving it open. But yeah, I, I, I definitely, um, academia kind of falls within the bell curve of things I can see myself doing. But I, I, I don't have any aspirations to be a career academic. It might happen. But, um, oh, how can, question in the chat, how can you afford higher education? Um, yeah. So, um, yeah, like not only, sorry to make everyone feel bad, not only do we have universal healthcare, um, you don't have to pay, um, for university in Australia. We've got a program. It's called the, um, higher education loan program. Um, yeah. So, yeah, emoji. Yeah. I get it. You know, I, I hate telling people this, um, fun fact, uh, when I was in the army, we actually, uh, did a lot of, um, like, um, co-training with American soldiers and we were actually under orders not to tell us American soldiers, what we, what money we were making, because we got paid twice as much as they did. And that would cause problems. And you know, and I think if that's terrible, you know, the American soldiers should get paid more. But you know, um, we've got a much bigger middle class in Australia. So, um, like, anyway, everyone from school teachers to police officers to prison guards earn a lot more. Here's an interesting fact. I keep sidetracking myself, but there's so many interesting to tell, tell you. Um, I was listening to an episode at E-Hustle and, um, uh, that one of the, uh, prisoners was saying, you know, um, we're in COVID lockdown. There's no visits and there's still drugs getting into the prison. And that's all I'm going to say. And obviously the guards are bringing it in. Um, when we went into COVID lockdown in Australia, there were riots because all the heroin dried up. Yeah, that nobody could get heroin in prison. And, uh, that's because, you know, prison guards are on a much higher wage. So why would you risk your wage, you know, getting fired by bringing drugs in when you're already on, you know, like, you know, um, a decent amount to begin with, but I'm getting back to the topic of hand, you know, um, um, so yeah, um, in Australia, you get an, um, you get an interest-free loan. Um, uh, everyone's entitled to $108,000 worth of, um, education. And, uh, keeping in mind, our education is much cheaper as well. Like a bachelor's degree, probably $25,000 maximum. But, um, you, um, it's attached to your, um, so what, what you'd call a social security number. And so you get this, um, interest-free debt. And, um, once you, um, graduate, uh, you don't have to start paying that back unless you go above a certain income bracket. And, uh, so it's kind of like tax. Um, if you, um, I'm upsetting this person, but I can't take it. I'm sorry. But, um, I'll just finish that. Um, uh, you, um, uh, yeah, so basically, um, if you're poor, if you never get a job with your degree, you never have to pay the money back. But if you get a high-paying job, then, uh, it comes out of your tax. So the money, the government takes, you get your paycheck, then they take their, um, their money out, and then they, um, take, um, the, uh, the, like, they'll take like $100 for, you know, um, to pay back your higher education loan program. But it's something you never have to worry about. So nobody really has, um, no, people don't know how much student that they have, because it just comes out of their pay automatically. But, um, I, um, so that's for bachelor's and master's degrees. Uh, PhDs, um, you don't have to pay for it all. Um, and I got a scholarship for mine. So, yeah. Oh, yeah, yeah. Rich people pay, uh, yes. I'm just looking at the comments in the chat. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So, um, we kind of have the, uh, the economic system in Australia that, like, uh, you had in America before Reagan flipped everything and made the, you know, um, the the middle class pay for everything and gave tax breaks to the rich. So, uh, yeah, um, who pays for, um, universal health care in Australia are pretty much rich people. Yeah. So, um, yeah, but I'm not sure how much we want to go down that rapid hole. It all comes back to Reagan. I swear to God. Yeah. Um, let's look at one last time. Look at Damien's, uh, site where you can, you know, there's a question about advice for aspiring writers by Damien's book. Good advice. Um, check out the library. I put in the link for the Stephen King, but it's very popular. You can get anywhere. It's probably any used bookstore, local bookstore. And, um, we're at our end of the night. If anyone has any last questions they'd like to ask. Damien, is there anything you wanted to show me to show up here? Um, no, just I'll probably scroll up with my, um, Instagram if you go back to the last screen. Yeah. Just so people can see the handle maybe. Um, but, um, um, yeah, people, advice for writing, um, yeah, um, is that just like, um, how do you eat an elephant one bite at a time? You know, people like, how did you write a book in, um, five months? And I was like, I just wrote like a thousand words every day. And, um, and after like, you know, five months I was done. I mean, granted, um, prison, I had no distractions. You know, I didn't have to worry about, you know, things like paying the bills, you know, rent and accommodation was, uh, provided. But, um, like, um, just, uh, just set a goal and stick with it. Um, like, you know, if you write 500 words a day, which isn't that hard, um, you know, after like, you know, three months that'll build up, you know. So, um, I definitely, yeah, just, just pick a small realistic goal. Like, don't try to hammer out 10,000 words at once. You'll do, you'll, you'll do yourself in. Just pick a small realistic goal and, and just stick to it every day. That's my best advice for writing a book. You know, um, yeah, um, like, I don't think you can go wrong that way. Thank you. Lots of love coming in on the chat. Thank you for sharing your work, Damien. And, uh, so, so generous, mailing me all of the pieces. And it's been a pleasure to work with you. And I do see our, um, our Exhibit's team was on tonight too. And I know they thank you very much as well. Yes, thank you for that. I'm, I'm really happy with how, I had no idea what you were going to do with it. And it looks great. I, um, you know, I, I, I wish I could have seen it in person. Um, ironically, um, because I, um, have a criminal record, I have to apply, uh, to the embassy for permission to come to the US. But, um, because of COVID, the embassy over here, so backlogged, um, that, that you need to apply a year in advance, uh, which is kind of ironic. You know, if I, um, you know, I can't come over to see it, uh, because I have a criminal record. But, you know, if I didn't have a criminal record, I wouldn't have become an artist in the first place. So, you know, gotta take the good with the bad. So, you know, I'm not unhappy, but, uh, yeah, I'm just, I love what they've done with it. It looks really great. So special thanks to the team. Yeah. Right on. All right, friends, library, community. Thank you so much for being here tonight. Damien, thank you so much for sharing your work. And it's the perks of Zoom. We have you here from Australia. Yes. Yeah, it's, um, very happy. Yeah, it's, yeah, made things a lot easier. Yeah. For sure. All right. Thank you so much. And best of luck in your further studies. Yeah, thanks a lot. Yeah, it's been great to be here. Bye. Thanks everyone in the chat. Thanks for the comments.