"Thirty days is all right," Tom said. "An’ a hunderd an’ eighty days is all right. But over a year – I dunno. There’s somepin about it that ain’t like nothin’ else in the worl’. Somepin screwy about it, somepin screwy about the whole idea a lockin’ people up. Oh, the hell with it! I don’ wanna talk about it. Look a the sun a-flashin’ on them windas."
– John Steinbeck
The Grapes of Wrath, Chapter 16. Tom Joad is talking to his brother Al about his time in jail. He questions the inhumanity of locking a person up for a long time.