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[crazybatlady]

CBL,

What was the source /context of the original list you posted?

Best wishes.

Oh lordy, I don't remember. That was two months ago. I think I did a search for banned book list and cut and pasted the first legit hit.

Sorry!

cbl

[dr_stones]

Perhaps a side-bar: books that should be banned--The Last of the Mohicans and anything else by James Fenimore Cooper: Mr. Clemens's famous essay really spells it out.  Those 19th century writers really knew how to blast one another . . . a lost art, unfortunately.

The Broken Twig Tales.  Forgot about those ...

[ipse_dixit]

"HANDMAID'S TALE" SPOILER AHEAD!
==========================================





My dad, who was a grade school principal and on the school board of my small Wisconsin hometown, called me when I was in grad school and asked me for a synopsis of Margaret Atwood's "A Handmaid's Tale." Apparently it was on a high school suggested reading list, and some of the local parents were horrified that the Bible was used as justification for extra-marital sex -- not to mention the use of the word "f***ing" when said extra-marital sex was taking place.

He asked if I would ban it. I'd rather cut off my right arm than ban just about anything, so I said no, and he said he thought it should stay as well. It stayed on the reading list when a few like-minded individuals agreed with my dad. I don't know if the outcome would have been different had the book been a required reading rather than just on a suggested list, where potentially offended parents could steer their kids away, or potentially offended kids could select another book.

[oldfullprof]

Amazing how boring some of the classical banned books are.  I can't read Henry Miller (boring).  Or William Burroughs.

[georgia_guy]

The Earth's Children Series by Jean M. Auel

I'll have to admit that by the fifth book, I was rather tired of hearing about the size of Jondalar's you-know-what, but did someone really get them banned?

[georgia_guy]

CBL,

What was the source /context of the original list you posted?

Best wishes.

The list appears to be the ALA's 100 most frequently challenged books from 1990-2000.

http://www.ala.org/Template.cfm?Section=bbwlinks&Template=/ContentManagement/ContentDisplay.cfm&ContentID=85714

[t_folk]

Perhaps a side-bar: books that should be banned--The Last of the Mohicans and anything else by James Fenimore Cooper: Mr. Clemens's famous essay really spells it out.  Those 19th century writers really knew how to blast one another . . . a lost art, unfortunately.

Here, here! God, so many times when I'm writing an article or a conference paper I just want to say, "John Doe's research, or lack thereof, demonstrates that fact he more than likely smokes crack - a lot of crack."

[spicoli]

Perhaps a side-bar: books that should be banned--The Last of the Mohicans and anything else by James Fenimore Cooper: Mr. Clemens's famous essay really spells it out.  Those 19th century writers really knew how to blast one another . . . a lost art, unfortunately.

Here, here! God, so many times when I'm writing an article or a conference paper I just want to say, "John Doe's research, or lack thereof, demonstrates that fact he more than likely smokes crack - a lot of crack."

John Doe smoked crack?  Darby Crash, for sure, but not good ole' John Doe.

[salomestrauss]

In my school district, Lolita was banned. Teachers weren't even allowed to discuss the book with us if we had read it outside of school. Naturally, this prompted my best friend and I to spend our entire junior year of high school making passing references to it in English class.

The best sort-of-banned book incident I can remember from school was when a teacher told us to purchase the Norton Critical Edition of Moby Dick, which has a few of Melville's interesting homoerotic letters in the back. Naturally, he was much chagrined (well, not naturally AT ALL, really, but I suppose he was uncomfortable with the topic) when everyone in the class started queering the 11th grade canon...

And then there was the "Milton's gay angels" incident, which was great insofar as it got the pretty much indifferent graduating high school seniors to actualy *read* PL.

[stewie]

At a certain college in Lynchburg, I wasn't allowed Michaelangelo's sonnets.... Or Vasari's Lives, which was kinda weird.

[bibliothecula]

The Earth's Children Series by Jean M. Auel

I'll have to admit that by the fifth book, I was rather tired of hearing about the size of Jondalar's you-know-what, but did someone really get them banned?

I think this was the chosen method of educating 6th graders about sex in my middleschool school district. The parents all knew everyone was passing Auel's books around and were probably worried that if they were banned, the parents would have to go back to giving "the talk."

[collegekidsmom]

Just to let anyone interested know-Banned Books Week is coming up.  The American Library Association sells various products (designed for ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom) to raise awareness of the issue. This is a piece of an email I received today from ALA:

"Raise awareness during Banned Books Week!
Banned Books Week is Sept. 29-Oct. 6...


Banned Books Week is sponsored by the American Booksellers Association, American
Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression, American Library Association, American
Society of Journalists and Authors, Association of American Publishers, and National
Association of College Stores. It is endorsed by the Center for the Book in the
Library of Congress."

[sikora]

The public library in Armpit Kansas has a banned book display (you go, librarians in this little town)!.  One title is Little House on the Prairie.  Good heavens, why?  I read somewhere that some political body wanted to ban The Diary of Ann Frank because it is too depressing. 

sikora

[dept_geek]

The public library in Armpit Kansas has a banned book display (you go, librarians in this little town)!.  One title is Little House on the Prairie.  Good heavens, why?  I read somewhere that some political body wanted to ban The Diary of Ann Frank because it is too depressing. 

sikora

This site: http://title.forbiddenlibrary.com/ tells why various books were (or were attempted to be) banned.

Little House in the Big Woods. Laura Ingalls Wilder. Buccaneer; harper; Transaction. Removed from the classrooms, but later reinstated, for third-graders at the Lincoln Unified School District in Stockton, Calif. (1996). Complainants also want the book removed from the library because it "promotes racial epithets and is fueling the fire of racism."


This one is just funny:
Where's Waldo? Martin Handford. Little. Challenged at the Public Libraries of Saginaw, Mich. (1989), Removed from the Springs Public School library in East Hampton, N.Y. (1993) because there is a tiny drawing of a woman lying on the beach wearing a bikini bottom but no top. Yes, but did they find Waldo?


Here is another great site: http://www.ala.org/ala/oif/bannedbooksweek/bannedbooksweek.htm

From the ALA site:

The "10 Most Challenged Books of 2006" reflect a range of themes, and consist of the following titles:

"And Tango Makes Three" by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell, for homosexuality, anti-family, and unsuited to age group;


"Gossip Girls" series by Cecily Von Ziegesar for homosexuality, sexual content, drugs, unsuited to age group, and offensive language;


"Alice" series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor for sexual content and offensive language;


"The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things" by Carolyn Mackler for sexual content, anti-family, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;


"The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison for sexual content, offensive language, and unsuited to age group;


"Scary Stories" series by Alvin Schwartz for occult/Satanism, unsuited to age group, violence, and insensitivity;


"Athletic Shorts" by Chris Crutcher for homosexuality and offensive language.


"The Perks of Being a Wallflower" by Stephen Chbosky for homosexuality, sexually explicit, offensive language, and unsuited to age group


"Beloved" by Toni Morrison for offensive language, sexual content, and unsuited to age group;


"The Chocolate War" by Robert Cormier for sexual content, offensive language, and violence.

Off the list this year, but on for several years past, are the "Catcher in the Rye" by J.D. Salinger, "Of Mice and Men" by John Steinbeck and "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" by Mark Twain.



This title, "The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big Round Things", perhaps belongs with the fluffy faculty :-)

[sikora]

Funny reasons to ban books.

When I was in graduate school, I worked as a clerk in a public library (great job!), for 5 years.  Couple of funny instances.  When Madonna's book Sex came out, the librarian chose not to buy it because it is spiral bond, and thus wouldn't last physically.  One day a woman stormed, and I mean stormed, into the library and demanded to know if we were getting the book.  The librarian said no, and then the patron demanded to know why not.  So the librarian explained that spiral bond books don't hold up, but fall apart readily.  The patron then really went ballistic.  "That's not the reason not to buy it!"  She was furious!

Another time, a patron brought Heather has Two Mommies up to the circulation desk.  She said it was inappropriate because it mentions aspirin, and children must not be given aspirin.  The book was dangerous because children and parents would think it was okay to give kids aspirin. 

Today, a teen and her mentor were in the public library, looking through the YA books.  The girl said "My parents spent 20 dollars on a Harry Potter book just to throw it in the fire.  It is against our religion.  I thought it was pretty good.  I just checked it out from here and read it on the bus to school."

sikora