The paper studies the extent of plastic relaxation around the tips of an infinite sequence of slitlike cracks contained in a large elastic solid. The cracks have a constant distance of vertical separation, and the solid is deforming under tensile loading (mode I). The plastic region around each of the crack tips coplanar with the crack itself is represented by a suitable distribution of edge dislocations, which is determined from equilibrium considerations. The latter lead to a singular integral equation which is solved numerically. The solution procedure is uniformly valid for any crack spacing. Furthermore, an alternate perturbation technique is used for widely spaced cracks. Solutions are obtained as a function of the crack spacing and the applied tensile load, and the results discussed from the point of fracture initiation at stresss concentrations.