In honor of Banned Books Week 2008, which starts today and runs through next Saturday, Oct. 4., I am issuing a challenge to myself and anyone who would like to join me: to read a banned or challenged book a day for the next eight days with a brief review to follow. For ideas, I highly encourage these two lists put out by the American Library Association:
Personally, here are the ones I’ve chosen:
I used mostly selections from this poster of Books Challenged or Banned in 2007-08, with three out of the eight singled out by a group known as Livingston Organization for Values in Education, or LOVE, who issued a challenge to several books in a Michigan high school to the county prosecutor, who struck down all of the challenges in one fell swoop:
After reading the books in question, it is clear that the explicit passages illustrated a larger literary, artistic, or political message and were not included solely to appeal to the prurient interests of minors. Whether these materials are appropriate for minors is a decision to be made by the school board, but I find that they are not in violation of the criminal laws.
And here is my schedule of when I will be reading them:
- Saturday: Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut: I believe I read this years ago, but it’s been so long and I would like to reread it. One of the four LOVE books.
- Sunday: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by J.K. Rowling: Amazingly, I haven’t read the Harry Potter series. I chose this one for Sunday, in special honor of St. Joseph School in Wakefield, Mass. which removed the book from its library in 2007 because the themes of witchcraft and sorcery were inappropriate for a Catholic school.
- Monday: The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton: This is the only one that is not off the 2007-08 list and instead is off the top 100 most frequently challenged books of 1990-2000 (see link above), where it rests at No. 42. I read this when in high school, but will also qualify for a new feature I’m doing called Monday’s Memory, where I will review a book from my youth.
- Tuesday: The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier: This book continues to make almost all lists, and I think when I was in high school, students in another section read it, but I never did.
- Wednesday: The Giver by Lois Lowry: Like Cormier’s book, this continues to make a lot of lists.
- Thursday: Black Boy by Richard Wright: Another LOVE selection.
- Friday: Running with Scissors by Augusten Burrough: Yet another LOVE selection.
- I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou: which was challenged in the state in which I live, Pennsylvania, in Mannheim Township schools near Lancaster.
Others whom I know are doing similar challenges:
- Natasha @ Maw Books
- Rebecca @ The Book Lady’s Blog
If you also are doing something related to Banned Books Week, add a link to your blog specific post in the comments and join the three of us (at least three, if not more) in the fun.
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That is a shorter HP. I read it as Philosopher’s Stone. I think I will read two books. If that is ok?!
I forgot about The Giver. I had to read it in middle school and I loved it. I’m going to have to read it again.
I’ll be posting all week about banned/challenged books and be offering a giveaway as well!
Happy Reading!
Good luck with your reading.
Not sure how you’ll go reading a Harry Potter in one day.
I have at some stage read 4 from your list.
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Nymeth: I’m also done with Slaughterhouse-Five. I thought I had read it, but I don’t remember it if I did, and I doubt it made as much as sense of it then as I do now. If that is possible. So it goes.
Natasha: These aren’t terribly long either. The longest might be the HP, but from what others have said, I’ll zoom through it, plus it looks like it’s one of the shorter HPs.
Devourer: I’m off to check out your link. May comment over there.
Holly: I don’t normally participate in things like this, but I chose four books I had and four books I didn’t. Plus I needed a kickstart in my reading. I’ve been in a little bit of a rut…I also love Huck Finn and To Kill A Mockingbird, but not many people I know who don’t like either one of those.
I’m not doing anything specific this week. Honestly, I hadn’t thought about it! It still amazes me what ends up on banned lists. Harry Potter is one of my and my boys’ favorite series. The Outsiders has been one of my favorite books, ever since I first read it in junior high school in the late ’70s! I read Of Mice and Men in a high school English class, along with Huckleberry Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird. The last two are favorites of mine as well.
I loved the quote you shared, “Whether these materials are appropriate for minors is a decision to be made by the school board, but I find that they are not in violation of the criminal laws.” It’s so true. Not everything is appropriate for every age group, but that doesn’t mean they should be banned either. My son is 10 and there certainly are books that I don’t want him reading now, but that he could read later.
Like Rebecca, I’m spotlighting a banned/challenged book every day, each of my posts go up at two. This link will take you to a search of everything I’ve written about banned books week.
Good luck! I didn’t choose lengthy books because I don’t think I could have completed it but I’ve got two read already and am loving it!
I loved Slaughterhouse-Five and The Giver. And of course, Harry Potter. You have some great reading ahead of you!
I’d like to read at least one banned book this week. I haven’t decided which yet, though.