Banned books: from feel-good to dangerous

The British newspaper the Guardian, which has absolutely wonderful book coverage, has a post inspired by Banned Books Week here in America. Take this slightly bemused quiz about books that have been banned in the U.S. and around the world to measure the degree to which you've exercised your freedom to read (at less than 40%, my score was "Rather ignorant, I’m afraid").

Banned Books Week began on Sept. 27 and runs through Saturday, Oct. 4. Many events are happening across Los Angeles, including an appearance by author Rick Wartzman on Thursday evening at Vroman's Bookstore. He'll be reading from, and discussing, his book "Obscene in the Extreme." It's about the banning and burning of John Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath" in 1939 in Kern County.

This weekend, L.A. Times books editor David L. Ulin urged us to think about Banned Books Week as more than just a celebration of challenged books that we like. "What happens when our ideals require us to defend a piece of writing that is reprehensible, that stands against everything we stand for?" he asks, continuing:

It's easy to condemn those who would remove "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn" from a library, but what about "The Turner Diaries" or "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion"? Or for that matter, "Tintin in the Congo," which Little, Brown dropped from its "Tintin" reissue series last fall after controversy arose about the book's racist overtones?

These are not just academic questions; they are the heart of the matter, regardless of where you stand on the ideological divide. How do we defend one book without defending all? Such a notion can't help but make us uneasy, but then, that's one of the most essential things books can do.

If you've made your peace with defending dangerous or even heinous speech, and if you were dubbed "a brave champion of liberty" after acing the Guardian's quiz, another front remains. For the second year in a row, the American Library Assn. is celebrating Banned Books Week in Second Life — the freedom to read needs defending, it seems, in our virtual worlds too.

— Carolyn Kellogg

Comments

[steve]

You people are paranoid. Interesting that you cannot name who is doing the banning. I have working in numerous professional and social environments and I have never met a person who wanted to censor or ban a book. Some of the books on your "so-called" banned list were required reading in my high school english classes and that was during the 1960's. Why do I not see "Little Black Sambo", which has been banned, on your list. You tolerant, accept the banning of some books but not others. Why tolerate the banning of any books. As a child from a multi-racial neighborhood I loved "Little Black Sambo". I see no negative racial implications in that book.