A performance of this play about solitary confinement written by Sarah Shourd, and accompanied by an engagement activity led by Amutabi Haines and Jihan McDonald, Friday, June 14, and Saturday, June 15, 2019.

Inspired by her journalistic investigation into solitary confinement in U.S. prisons and her own life experience in an Iranian prison, The Box is a play about the resilience of the human spirit—and its limits. A story of bravery, terror, loss and collective resistance, the play reveals the characters’ transformation leaving us with a glimmer of hope while uncovering harsh and horrifying conditions in prisons today.

Performed by Carlos Aguirre, Lawrence Pierre Radecker, Dameionn Brown, Jordan Don, and Ralph Washington Jr. Produced in partnership with the Pulitzer Center, Thomas Bowersox, Toni Rembe, and Arthur Rock.

The spirit of this event was to collectively bear witness and celebrate resilience. Facilitators Amutabi Haines and Jihan McDonald opened the space with a grounding exercise and facilitated an engagement piece after the performance.                             

This event was also the San Francisco debut of the graphic novel, Flying Kites: A Story of the 2013 California Prisoners Hunger Strike, co-created by Shourd and classmates in the Stanford Graphic Novel Project.

Co-hosted by the Success Center and the Stanford Graphic Novel Project. The mission of the Success Center is to empower marginalized community members through education, employment, and art, so they may develop a positive self-image as well as a sense of hope and purpose for their future.

The Stanford Graphic Novel Project is a twenty-week course at Stanford University, designed to teach nonfiction research, visual storytelling, and long-form narrative structures to undergraduates through the collaborative creation of a graphic novel. All novels are based on real-life stories and events.