April 19, 2011
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Banned Books
The Daily News
1 I craned my neck to look at a poster in our library yesterday.
2 It had a poster inside with a list of banned books. I was in a bit of a hurry because I stayed late getting papers graded and lessons planned, so I was unable to get a really clear look, but the poster had at least a hundred famous books listed.
3 I may go back there today to get a list.
4 I just wanted to see if Farenheit 451 made the list. Of course it did. This is America.
5 I’m quite sure that it will be a shocking (or not shocking) list. I have to think the most incredible book to be banned is the dictionary, both Am Heritage and Merriam’s.
6 I began looking into book banning and found it a monumental task to get a good, comprehensive list.
7 At around 3 a.m. I thought of book banning as an interesting topic to bring to the fore.
8 It was sort of like looking at pictures of mountains I would like to hike this summer.
9 In the long run, I’ll just realize I’m not quite up to taking on a task as huge as book banning and attempting to make that climb.
10 Just a cursory look will bring a lot of questions to the forefront.
11 I did come across the Huff Post’s list of the top 11 most surprising banned books.
12 It begins with the dictionaries and goes south from there.
13 So here are the Huff Post’s top eleven:
The Dictionary
The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
Sylvester and the Magic Pebble by William Steig
Beloved AND The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. Both won Nobel Prizes.
Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See? by Bill Martin, Jr. and Eric Carle
James and the Giant Peach AND The Witches by Roald Dahl
Anne Frank: The Diary of a Young Girl (with an intro by Eleanor Roosevelt)
Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
For Whom the Bell Tolls AND A Farewell to Arms by Ernest Hemingway
A Light in the Attic: Poems and Drawings by Shel Silverstein
A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
14 I decided when posting this that I will simply list some books that are banned. If you wish to visit the Huff Post’s article, here is the link:
15 I would love to comment on each of these, but I have neither the time nor the inclination.
16 Always an interesting topic. I wonder if Snookie’s book has been banned?
17 AnywayZ, I thought I’d simply like to share a sampling of what goes on across this Great Land of Ours on a daily basis.
18 I’d love to say it’s a non-issue, but it is clearly worth noting.
19 Because ultimately, who decides these things? What are the criteria? I’m seldom sure. Some things we could understand as perhaps “inappropriate” for small children.
20 But the larger issue is that of censoring thought.
21 So no, I don’t think it’s a non-issue.
22 I just think it is something that strikes me about twice a year, especially when I read about true things that enormously powerful people we all know and love have done to wreak havoc on our economy, or on our troops, or on our schools, or on our nation.
23 Anyway, it isn’t an issue I intend to labor over at 4 a.m. I have bigger fish to fry.
24 It was just a moment in my day yesterday. I had to look through bars to see the poster in the library, and had one of those moments.
25 What is happening in our schools is downright frightening.
26 The fact that librarians won’t be in libraries enough to fight this stuff is pretty scary. Our librarian is back in the classroom, and is clearly overworked. But she is there most every day working in the back after school. It’s heroic to me.
27 I remember when I was doing activities and had to set up a district/student meeting in our library. It was to begin at 4 p.m. Right before the meeting somebody told me that the lights in the library didn’t work.
28 I stood absolutely stunned. We have a pretty high-tech school, so a lot of things are run by computers: lighting, heating, air-conditioning, etc. A gal from the District who shall remain unnamed here kept looking at ME as though it were my fault.
29 I guess it was because I wore a tie and carried a walkie. She was outraged, and kept sniping at me. I was about to say, “Hey, I just bought you a sandwich!” I had NO idea the lights in our library didn’t work.
30 And to be honest, I don’t know if they do to this minute. It has huge windows and gets lots of daylight, but I don’t even recall seeing lights that worked in there, ever.
31 I’m worried about banned books and it turns out that after 5 p.m. you can’t even see the poster.
32 Ah, vell.
33 You get what you pay for.
34 And sadly, it’s looking as though it is all going to be at such a cost.
35 At such a cost. At what cost?
36 Gottago.
37 Peace.
~H~
