Bone Orchard: Reflections on Life Under Sentence of Death

Death row prisoner George T. Wilkerson and criminology professor Robert Johnson explore the psychological experiences unique to those serving death sentences. Using essays, short stories, and poetry grounded in first-hand experience as well as interviews and surveys with other death row prisoners, Bone Orchard examines the ways a death sentence poses existential burdens on the condemned and those who love them. Wilkerson and Johnson touch on elements key to understanding life under sentence of death, including banishment, isolation, the avoidance of calendars and the bending of time, ever-present reminders of mortality, a ‘dead man walking’ syndrome that unfolds over decades on death row, and more. At times darkly humorous, Bone Orchard digs deep to reveal what it’s really like to live in the shadow of the executioner.