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Original article: Entrevista a Paulina Vergara y el proyecto Cartas Valparaíso: «Con los años hemos construido un puente de palabras entre el adentro y el afuera»

Paulina Vergara is an editor, educator, cultural manager, and director of the Public Letters Cultural Center, an organization that has been developing literary projects in incarceration contexts since 2019, with a special focus on letter writing as a tool for expression, connection, and collective creation.

Through workshops in prisons across Chile and Mexico, Vergara has spearheaded initiatives aimed at integrating the voices of incarcerated individuals into the national literary landscape, challenging the boundaries between inside and outside through the written word.

In this context, Public Letters will participate in the upcoming edition of La Furia del Libro de Verano 2025, taking place from December 18 to 21 at the Gabriela Mistral Cultural Center (GAM), presenting the Cartas Valparaíso Project, an initiative that creates communication bridges between incarcerated women and civil society through letter exchange. This year, the project also incorporates the experience of the Ítaca Foundation, which works with adolescent offenders.

During the fair, Public Letters will host two public activities aimed at sharing the impact and power of letter writing in confinement contexts. On Thursday, December 18, from 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM, the event ‘Letters Are Written’ will offer a workshop and writing service where attendees can draft, request, or receive guidance on writing letters, held at the GAM’s Reader Space.

On the same day, from 6:00 PM to 7:00 PM, in room C2 of GAM, the launch of the fanzine ‘Cartas Project: History of a Workshop’ will take place, accompanied by a discussion on the writing, reading, and circulation of letters between incarcerated and free individuals.

Public Letters arrives at La Furia del Libro 2025 with the Cartas Valparaíso Project and several open activities. What does it mean for you as a collective to occupy this literary and cultural space after years of working from and toward confinement?

For us, being in a literary space like La Furia del Libro is significant because we have always sought to include incarcerated individuals in the Chilean literary map, and this fair has become one of the most important events in the field. In this sense, it is an opportunity to make the invisible visible. Additionally, presenting these voices through letters is highly meaningful. We not only bring these stories to this cultural event, but we do so in a manner that is organic, analog, and very intimate. Over the years, we have constructed a bridge of words between inside and outside.

The Cartas Valparaíso Project aims to connect incarcerated women with civil society through letter writing. What transformations have you observed in participants when these bridges are effectively activated?

Inside, the need for expression prevails; incarcerated women need to be heard, and the arrival of a letter confirms that someone cares about them. Paper becomes a safe space for communication and expression, as well as for sharing life stories. There is no risk involved. With correspondence, doors and windows to new worlds are opened, showcasing the dreams and projects of participants who eagerly await the arrival of letters.

This year you included the experience of Fundación Ítaca, focused on youth offenders. How do these two realities—adult women and adolescent offenders—communicate within the same epistolary language?

I have spoken with Alejandra Michelsen from Ítaca many times about our work, and the moment has finally come to share and exchange experiences publicly. While both organizations employ letters as a tool, we use them differently to promote the same goal: expression and creation through writing. This dialogue reveals that both realities need to express themselves, and letters are one of the ideal mediums for this, as they transcend communication and foster reflection and creativity during the writing process.

The fanzine ‘Cartas Project: History of a Workshop’ gathers letters, illustrations, chronicles, and instructions for writing. What does this publication reveal about the intimate collective process of writing from prison?

The purpose of this publication was to document the process experienced in the workshops over six months, during which many significant events occurred in the lives of participants. Their letters capture the absences and waits transformed into words, but also the lack of dignity and the precariousness of our penal system. The letters and illustrations record day-to-day life inside, while the photographs embody the dreams of freedom.

Inside, there are identities tied to the stories that women bring and the ones they write daily in an environment marked by survival. In this context, the Cartas Project adds a new identity; that of the letter writer—someone who opens their heart and connects with the world of their addressee, who is read and thus “heard” beyond the bars, who reflects and dreams while writing and dares to envision a different world. This new identity of workshop participants is intimate yet also collective.

Over the years, Public Letters has fostered literary projects and, in this instance, a solidarity action such as the recent campaign for hygiene products for women without visitors. How do you navigate the intersection between cultural work and material urgencies within such a precarious penitentiary system?

Although our focus is on culture and particularly literature, we cannot remain indifferent to the realities faced by workshop participants, which permeate every session. The material aid we previously provided personally has now been extended to other women facing similar situations. If they have no visitors—meaning they lack a support network—they do not have the basics: toilet paper, soap, shampoo, etc., to live with dignity.

You have worked with letters and workshops in confinement contexts since 2012 in Mexico and Chile. What personal learnings have led you to consolidate a project like Public Letters, and what motivates you to continue supporting it today?

I firmly believe that it is possible to contribute to building a better country through what each person knows, wants, and can do. In my case, it is through writing and letter exchange that I began, guided solely by intuition. Despite the challenges involved in sustaining a cultural project in prison, I could not stop because over the years I have witnessed the impact of letters on the lives of those who participate in the workshops: encounters through letters have occurred between mothers and children distanced by the difficulties of life behind bars. People inside and outside have forged bonds that would be impossible without this project. I have trained letter writers inside who replicate the workshop upon their release and bring it into their realities. When the difficulties seem insurmountable, I have asked myself whether I can leave this work behind, and the answer has always been no.

In your view, what is lacking in the Chilean literary world to genuinely and permanently integrate the voices of incarcerated individuals, and how do you envision the future of that “literary geography” you seek to complete?

I envision it with more resources to professionalize the editing of literary voices that are beginning to emerge from within. I dream of attractive, modern editions that showcase the diverse stories circulating within a prison and captivate readers from the very first moment. Moreover, I hope that most authors are individuals who have been incarcerated, who know that reality firsthand and have made the choice to tell it.

If epistolary writing has proven to be a tool for connection and transformation, what is needed today for projects like Cartas Valparaíso to be implemented in other prisons in Chile?

Cultural activities, particularly literature, are not considered relevant in a process of (re)integration. Cultural rights in prisons are not respected; there is always something more urgent than a literature workshop. In this sense, the scant resources for (re)integration focus on labor aspects. There is a lack of awareness about the formative role of art and culture in a person’s life; authorities are not clear that through reading and writing, for example, expression improves, doors to other realities open, one reflects on the world and one’s own life, and freedom is projected. These reflections and experiences are transmitted to children and packed away for life “on the street,” which is what freedom is called in prison jargon.

La entrada Interview with Paulina Vergara on the Cartas Valparaíso Project: «Over the Years, We Have Built a Bridge of Words Between Inside and Outside» se publicó primero en El Ciudadano.