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Literary Friday: I Read Banned Books! :D

Friday, October 5, 2012

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It's Banned Books Week @ Literary Friday!  I hope you well celebrate the freedom to read with me today!

So why do we celebrate Banned Books Week?  Here is some information from the American Library Association:

Banned Books Week is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read. Typically held during the last week of September, it highlights the value of free and open access to information. Banned Books Week brings together the entire book community –- librarians, booksellers, publishers, journalists, teachers, and readers of all types –- in shared support of the freedom to seek and to express ideas, even those some consider unorthodox or unpopular.

Here is a list of the most frequently challenged books of 2011 and the reasons they were challenged:

ttyl; ttfn; l8r, g8r (series), by Lauren Myracle
Reasons: offensive language; religious viewpoint; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
The Color of Earth (series), by Kim Dong Hwa
Reasons: nudity; sex education; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
The Hunger Games trilogy, by Suzanne Collins
Reasons: anti-ethnic; anti-family; insensitivity; offensive language; occult/satanic; violence
My Mom's Having A Baby! A Kid's Month-by-Month Guide to Pregnancy, by Dori Hillestad Butler
Reasons: nudity; sex education; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, by Sherman Alexie
Reasons: offensive language; racism; religious viewpoint; sexually explicit; unsuited to age group
Alice (series), by Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
Reasons: nudity; offensive language; religious viewpoint
Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
Reasons: insensitivity; nudity; racism; religious viewpoint; sexually explicit
What My Mother Doesn't Know, by Sonya Sones
Reasons: nudity; offensive language; sexually explicit
Gossip Girl (series), by Cecily Von Ziegesar
Reasons: drugs; offensive language; sexually explicit
To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
Reasons: offensive language; racism

Even the Holy Bible is challenged often!

This week I re-read To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  I have a signed copy, and it is one of my prized possessions!  I adore this book, and Scout Finch is one of my favorite Southern heroines of all time.  I enjoy reading about Scout's carefree summertime antics with Jem and Dill. Atticus' bravery always inspires, and didn't everyone have a scary house in the neighborhood like Boo Radley's....the house everyone avoided?  LOVE this book, and I think it would be tragic to ban it.

Do you know the second thing the Nazis confiscated after guns?  Books! {and} they burned them!  Boo!!!

I am giving away prizes!  I will be giving away a fiftieth anniversary copy of To Kill a Mockingbird to one lucky winner, plus a $25 Barnes and Noble gift card.




Here is how you can win:  You get one chance by leaving a comment, and three additional chances by linking up to Literary Friday.  That's it!  I will announce the winner on Saturday, October 13th.


Do you read banned books?  I bet you do!

Until next time...

Happy reading!
Ricki Jill

7 comments

  1. I am right with you on banned books. I was a student teacher who had to accompany the school language arts teachers and librarians to an actual book burning so very many years ago... I was only 22 years old, and I am 58 today.... and I still remember and can feel the tears begin as I think of that awful, awful day. I was standing there in absolute tears, and I thought I would literally explode in anger and impotence. The leaders of the burning read passages from the books they felt were offensive and then threw the book in the fire. The crowd then roared and applauded.... It was hideous. I know I had taught Huckleberry Finn, and it was one. I also believe good old Cather in the Rye was one. Catch 21 and many others. It was simply horrifying. horrifying. I think of that whenever someone mentions book banning... just sharing, honey.

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  2. Scout!!! OH how I cringed in high school when i HAD to read that book but oh how I love it now.

    There are so many banned books that I love and my heart would break to see them destroyed. Heck they occupy half my bookselves in the house! I would burn up in the fire like in Fahrenheit 451 if someone came for them.

    It was hard for me to pick a book to review. So I did a new one. Thanks so much for hosting, I love your Literary Fridays.

    Hugs
    Caroline

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  3. I haven't read "Mockingbird" in years. My daughter is in Library Science and her campus ALA group makes a big deal out of Banned Book Week. It involves a lot of sidewalk chalk!

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  4. Y'know I never read TKAMB in school. I was an adult, teaching a high school English class before I read it. And I love it! And yes, we had a house in our neighborhood we thought was haunted (or at the very least a mystery)...very Boo Radley-esque.

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  5. This is one of my favorite books. I just love Scout.

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  6. I love To Kill A Mockingbird. One of my all time favorites. I don't believe in banning books. There are many I have absolutely no desire to read, but as an adult I am able to decide for myself. As for children, parents need to decide what is appropriate for their children to read. I am grateful to live in a free country where I can make those choices.

    Hugs,
    Laura

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  7. Since I am a former worker in a library it was amazing for me to see what kids are reading these days and what is classic and considered banned. I blushed at some of the books in the YA section, but it is all how kids read and see things these days.
    So it is life now. If government or parents think it is too much for kids to read I think they are out of the loop on real life.
    They hear and see so much worse in our own school systems than they could ever read in a book.
    We allow horrible cable tv shows or R rated movies but ban books???
    Silly
    Read on!!
    Amy

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Hello, Lovelies!

I'm Ricki Jill. Welcome! I'm honored that you're reading my blog. I enjoy sharing my creative lifestyle @ The Bookish Dilettante. For more information about my blog, please read the Start Here page. Thank-you for stopping by, and I hope you'll consider following me via email.

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