Don't Tempt Me

Thanks, Patti, for sharing!

Independence Day

Happy 4th of July, everybody. Have fun. Be safe. Read on.

2009 Challenged Books

One of my favorite authors (Jodi Picoult) and one of my least favorite--and that's being very kind--(Stephenie Meyer) have an interesting connection. Both are on the ALA’s Top Ten Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2009:

1. ttyl, ttfn, l8r, g8r (series), by Lauren Myracle
Reasons: Nudity, Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group, Drugs

2. And Tango Makes Three, by Peter Parnell and Justin Richardson
Reasons: Homosexuality

3. The Perks of Being A Wallflower, by Stephen Chbosky
Reasons: Homosexuality, Sexually Explicit, Anti-Family, Offensive Language, Religious Viewpoint, Unsuited to Age Group, Drugs, Suicide

4. To Kill A Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
Reasons: Racism, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group

5. Twilight (series) by Stephenie Meyer
Reasons: Sexually Explicit, Religious Viewpoint, Unsuited to Age Group

6. Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
Reasons: Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group

7. My Sister’s Keeper, by Jodi Picoult
Reasons: Sexism, Homosexuality, Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Religious Viewpoint, Unsuited to Age Group, Drugs, Suicide, Violence

8. The Earth, My Butt, and Other Big, Round Things, by Carolyn Mackler
Reasons: Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group

9. The Color Purple, Alice Walker
Reasons: Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group

10. The Chocolate War, by Robert Cormier
Reasons: Nudity, Sexually Explicit, Offensive Language, Unsuited to Age Group

Free to Think

“Free societies are societies in motion, and with motion comes tension, dissent, friction. Free people strike sparks, and those sparks are the best evidence of freedom’s existence.”
--Salman Rushdie

"Books won't stay banned. They won't burn. Ideas won't go to jail. In the long run of history, the censor and the inquisitor have always lost. The only sure weapon against bad ideas is better ideas. The source of better ideas is wisdom. The surest path to wisdom is a liberal education."
-- Alfred Whitney Griswold, Essays on Education

“The sooner we all learn to make a decision between disapproval and censorship, the better off society will be. Censorship cannot get at the real evil, and it is an evil in itself.”
--Granville Hicks

“Books and ideas are the most effective weapons against intolerance and ignorance.”
--Lyndon Baines Johnson

“We are not afraid to entrust the American people with unpleasant facts, foreign ideas, alien philosophies, and competitive values. For a nation that is afraid to let its people judge the truth and falsehood in an open market is a nation that is afraid of its people."
--John F. Kennedy

“Who will watch the watchers?”
--Juvenal

"Appeasement" Update

The home of Martin Rynja of Gibson Square Publishers, British publisher of The Jewel of Medina, was fire bombed last Saturday morning. Before this incident Rynja had said that it was “imperative” that the book be published: “In an open society there has to be open access to literary works, regardless of fear. As an independent publishing company, we feel strongly that we should not be afraid of the consequences of debate.”

What does he say now? Full steam ahead.

Sherry Jones, author of the historical novel about the Prophet Muhammad and his child bride, said that Rynja “has shown nothing but courage.”

I think that's an appropriate attitude to display during Banned Books Week.

(for background information, see 9/24/08 post "Appeasement: Been There, Done That"

For A Limited Engagement . . .

Phillip Martin, columnist and film critic for the Arkansas Democrat Gazette, will be speaking at Harding University tonight. The event begins at 7:00 in Cone Chapel, American Heritage Center. It's free and open to the public.

And, since I've quoted him a couple of times on my blog regarding freedom in the arts, I thought I'd reprint those quotes here:

“Often the words that we don’t—that we can’t—say are among the most potent. And to limit the tools an artist can use cheats society of potential truth telling. We might think of art as a special circumstance where the normal rules of decorum need not apply so long as the work produced justifies the outrage it incites. . . . the truth is the world is rough, and we cannot hope to educate everyone to our own standards for civilization. Art . . . has to engage the world honestly to be effective.” (from my 8/23/08 post)

“If we want a world alive with art and music and possibility, we have to accept that there will be accidents and tragedies and that innocents will suffer.” (from my 8/30/08 post)

100 Most Frequently Challenged Books, 1990-2000

1. Scary Stories (Series) by Alvin Schwartz
2. Daddy's Roommate by Michael Willhoite
3. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
4. The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
6. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
7. Harry Potter (Series) by J.K. Rowling
8. Forever by Judy Blume
9. Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
10. Alice (Series) by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
11. Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
12. My Brother Sam is Dead by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
13. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
14. The Giver by Lois Lowry
15. It's Perfectly Normal by Robie Harris
16. Goosebumps (Series) by R.L. Stine
17. A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Newton Peck
18. The Color Purple by Alice Walker
19. Sex by Madonna
20. Earth's Children (Series) by Jean M. Auel
21. The Great Gilly Hopkins by Katherine Paterson
22. A Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L'Engle
23. Go Ask Alice by Anonymous
24. Fallen Angels by Walter Dean Myers
25. In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
26. The Stupids (Series) by Harry Allard
27. The Witches by Roald Dahl
28. The New Joy of Gay Sex by Charles Silverstein
29. Anastasia Krupnik (Series) by Lois Lowry
30. The Goats by Brock Cole
31. Kaffir Boy by Mark Mathabane
32. Blubber by Judy Blume
33. Killing Mr. Griffin by Lois Duncan
34. Halloween ABC by Eve Merriam
35. We All Fall Down by Robert Cormier
36. Final Exit by Derek Humphry
37. The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
38. Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
39. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
40. What's Happening to my Body? Book for Girls: A Growing-Up Guide for Parents & Daughters by Lynda Madaras
41. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
42. Beloved by Toni Morrison
43. The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
44. The Pigman by Paul Zindel
45. Bumps in the Night by Harry Allard
46. Deenie by Judy Blume
47. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
48. Annie on my Mind by Nancy Garden
49. The Boy Who Lost His Face by Louis Sachar
50. Cross Your Fingers, Spit in Your Hat by Alvin Schwartz
51. A Light in the Attic by Shel Silverstein
52. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
53. Sleeping Beauty Trilogy by A.N. Roquelaure (Anne Rice)
54. Asking About Sex and Growing Up by Joanna Cole
55. Cujo by Stephen King
56. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
57. The Anarchist Cookbook by William Powell
58. Boys and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy
59. Ordinary People by Judith Guest
60. American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis
61. What's Happening to my Body? Book for Boys: A Growing-Up Guide for Parents & Sons by Lynda Madaras
62. Are You There, God? It's Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
63. Crazy Lady by Jane Conly
64. Athletic Shorts by Chris Crutcher
65. Fade by Robert Cormier
66. Guess What? by Mem Fox
67. The House of Spirits by Isabel Allende
68. The Face on the Milk Carton by Caroline Cooney
69. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
70. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
71. Native Son by Richard Wright
72. Women on Top: How Real Life Has Changed Women's Fantasies by Nancy Friday
73. Curses, Hexes and Spells by Daniel Cohen
74. Jack by A.M. Homes
75. Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo A. Anaya
76. Where Did I Come From? by Peter Mayle
77. Carrie by Stephen King
78. Tiger Eyes by Judy Blume
79. On My Honor by Marion Dane Bauer
80. Arizona Kid by Ron Koertge
81. Family Secrets by Norma Klein
82. Mommy Laid An Egg by Babette Cole
83. The Dead Zone by Stephen King
84. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
85. Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
86. Always Running by Luis Rodriguez
87. Private Parts by Howard Stern
88. Where's Waldo? by Martin Hanford
89. Summer of My German Soldier by Bette Greene
90. Little Black Sambo by Helen Bannerman
91. Pillars of the Earth by Ken Follett
92. Running Loose by Chris Crutcher
93. Sex Education by Jenny Davis
94. The Drowning of Stephen Jones by Bette Greene
95. Girls and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy
96. How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
97. View from the Cherry Tree by Willo Davis Roberts
98. The Headless Cupid by Zilpha Keatley Snyder
99. The Terrorist by Caroline Cooney
100. Jump Ship to Freedom by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
     

If you are a reader, you'll probably be surprised by some of these. I was. Obviously, I haven't read them all. But I have read quite a few of them. I've taught some of these novels to Junior High and High School students; I've taught some at the university level. I've even read some of them to my own children--and I would consider myself a discerning reader, especially when reading to my own children.

Appeasement: Been There, Done That

"Dort, wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen." (“Where they have burned books, they will end in burning human beings.”)
—Heinrich Heine, from his play Almansor (1821)




Have you heard about the book that Random House Publishing Group pulled because “credible and unrelated sources” warned that the historical novel “could incite acts of violence by a small radical segment” of the Islamic community? The Jewel of Medina, Sherry Jones’ first novel, is about the Prophet Muhammad and his six-year-old child bride Aisha, a relationship that was consummated when she reached the age of nine.

Now, I’m not an expert on Islam and don’t pretend to be, but it’s obvious that there’s a problem here. Salman Rushdie, whose 1989 work The Satanic Verses led to a death threat from the Ayatollah Khomeini, complained that the publisher had bowed to intimidation: “I am very disappointed to hear that my publishers, Random House, have canceled another author’s novel, apparently because of their concerns about possible Islamic reprisals. . . . This is censorship by fear, and it sets a very bad precedent indeed.”

He’s right. Now, it’s nothing new that people write and publish books that offend certain groups. Some Christians didn’t like Margaret Atwood’s A Handmaid’s Tale; other Christians have wanted to ban Harry Potter. Readers of both The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird have been offended by their “racist slurs.” Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice has been classified by some as anti-Semitic. I won’t argue for or against any of these works here (although some of them rate pretty high on my all-time-favorites list), but the point is that they were published. Whether you read them or not is up to you.

In his article “Lights Out on Liberty,” reprinted in the 9/7/08 edition of The Arkansas Democrat Gazette, author Mark Steyn informs us that author Oriana Fallaci of Italy was, at her death, in the process of being sued all over Europe by groups who claimed that her writings on “the contradiction between Islam and the Western tradition of liberty” were “not merely offensive, but criminal.” Michel Houellebecq of France “was sued by Muslim and other ‘anti-racist groups’ who believed the opinions of a fictional character in one of his novels was likewise criminal” (my emphasis). Steyn himself is being sued by the Canadian Islamic Congress because of his “flagrant Islamaphobia.” This charge stems from the simple act of citing plot twists in his review of a novel by another author, Robert Ferrigno. “These days,” he laments, these people “apparently . . . believe that describing the plot of a novel should be illegal.” Steyn takes these literary challenges very seriously: “I would argue,” he says, “that these incremental concessions to Islam are ultimately a bigger threat than terrorism.”


Ayaan Hirsi Ali, in her memoir Infidel, argues that blind multiculturalism does not work. People, and governments, try "to be tolerant for the sake of consensus, but the consensus [is] empty," she explains. In fact, she concludes that, in the name of "tolerance," certain groups are allowed to oppress others and deprive them of basic human rights. She, too, received death threats for expressing her observations.

There’s an often repeated saying that those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Appeasement didn’t work with Hitler; why do we think it will work today? And what do we risk by trying it?

“It'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