Present dissertation Espaços de morte, escritos de vida - Visões literária e jornalística do cárcere brasileiro [Death places, life writings - Literary and journalistic views on the Brazilian penal system] makes a reflection upon the contemporary literature produced by authors who had been or still are as captives within the Brazilian penal system. The main purpose of this essay is to approach the subject of imprisonment on literature analyzing how literary works deal with imprisonment experiences and how media presents these experiences to general population. It is a reflection on how the writing that arises from jail can denounce - even though it is not its primary intention - a ruined and crude penal system. The intention is to present how these writings raise, display, and show up what newspaper and television do not and to look for discursive differences between the literary and journalistic narrative forms of describing the penal system. In the confluence of these issues, the scope is to analyze how literature born in prison can develop a strategy of creating life and survival in a situation often associated to death.