“Restriction of free thought and free speech is the most dangerous of all subversions. It is the one un-American act that could most easily defeat us.”?Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas,” The One Un-American Act.” Nieman Reports, vol. 7, no. 1 (Jan. 1953): p. 20.
?[I]t’s not just the books under fire now that worry me. It is the books that will never be written. The books that will never be read. And all due to the fear of censorship. As always, young readers will be the real losers.? ? Judy Blume
“Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings.” (German: “Dort, wo man B?cher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen.”) ?Heinrich Heine, from his play Almansor (1821)
This week marks the 25th anniversary of the Banned Books Week, which is usually celebrated during the last week of September. I’m not sure if many people are familiar with it. I, myself, only acquainted to it this year by pure accident, as I was googling, looking for a nice e-book to download.
And now I’ve stumbled upon the site American Library Association website, which keeps an accounting of “objectionable” reads.
Here are 10 of the most challenged books of the 21st century:
1. Harry Potter series by J.K. Rowling
2. The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
3. Alice series by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
4. “Of Mice and Men” by John Steinbeck
5. “I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou
6. “Fallen Angels” by Walter Dean Myers
7. “It’s Perfectly Normal” by Robie Harris
8. Scary Stories series by Alvin Schwartz
9. Captain Underpants series by Dav Pilkey
10. “Forever” by Judy Blume
These books were challenged due to one or more of the following reasons: violence, sexual content, homosexuality, nudity, racism, or offensive language.
And for several years, J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series topped the list.
Personally, I don’t like the idea of banning any literature from being kept in the shelves of libraries or bookstores. If you don’t like a book or you don’t like the ideas that book is perpetuating, then leave it alone. Or tell your friends/neighbors not to read it because you think it’s not good. Anyway, it’s your right to say what you think of the things around you. But don’t IMPOSE your will on other people just because you think you find these books “objectionable”.
For more information about Banned Books Week, go here.
For information about book burnings in the 21st century (I think this is the modern version of the witch burnings. Remember Fr. Regino Cortes, O.P., biblical scholar, and his group of “believers” burned copies of the Da Vinci Code in protest of its contents?), go here.
(By the way, Fr. Regino Cortes already died a few months ago at the age of 64. May he rest in peace and God bless him, even if he burned hundreds of books of Dan Brown, whose books may contain inaccuracies, but nevertheless, I think, did not deserve the burning.)
I love my freedom of thought and speech. AND I WANT TO KEEP IT!
