Happy Silver Anniversary to BANNED BOOKS WEEK, you’ve lasted half my life!
Hope you’ll be around for the rest of my life, or we’re doomed.
“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.
Eryn Haley-Brothers, who graduated from Fayetteville High last year, got a firsthand lesson in civic action when she organized students to oppose any restrictions on library books.
“The scary thing was that not many teenagers knew what was going on,” said the 18-year-old, who had read more than half the books on (book-challenging parent) Ms. Taylor’s list.
Push by Sapphire, a novel available in the school library about a young girl who suffers through poverty and incest, “was the saddest book I ever read,” Ms. Haley-Brothers said. “I could understand why someone with a conservative eye would want to ban it, but if you really look at the core of the book, it’s about poverty in America and how it affects everyone.”
1984
I just read it last week. It’s one of those books I’ve always seen snippets from, had the general idea what it was about, but never read the real thing.
Thank goodness, our local library had a “Banned Books” display and I was reminded to finally read this book.
Nance
I heard some religious scholars on NPR the other day talking about how all voters are value voters one way or another, and as I recall one described his own values focus as a triad of “poverty, peace and planet Earth.” Maybe I can find more on that . . .
Favorite Daughter has a sweatshirt with banned book titles printed all down the front. She loves to wear it because every year, people stop her and read the list and exclaim over books like Mary Poppins being on it.
It’s quite the attitude adjuster!
JJ
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