It's Banned Book Week this week, when the American Library Association and readers everywhere point out that we live in a free society yet randomly restrict children's access to books they want to read. Reading is dangerous, you know. So close your eyes, because we're about to share four items on book banning that you probably shouldn't see.

1. The Most Banned Books of 2008

1. And Tango Makes Three, by Justin Richardson and Peter Parnell. 
Reasons: anti-ethnic, anti-family, homosexuality, religious viewpoint, and unsuited to age group. I can say from experience this is a very good book! We got it for Z when she was three.


2. His Dark Materials trilogy, by Philip Pullman. Reasons: political viewpoint, religious viewpoint, and violence


3. TTYL; TTFN; L8R, G8R (series), by Lauren Myracle. Reasons: offensive language, sexually explicit, and unsuited to age group


4. Scary Stories (series), by Alvin Schwartz. 
Reasons: occult/satanism, religious viewpoint, and violence


5. Bless Me, Ultima, by Rudolfo Anaya. 
Reasons: occult/satanism, offensive language, religious viewpoint, sexually explicit, and violence


6. The Perks of Being a Wallflower, by Stephen Chbosky. Reasons: drugs, homosexuality, nudity, offensive language, sexually explicit, suicide, and unsuited to age group


7. Gossip Girl (series), by Cecily von Ziegesar. 
Reasons: offensive language, sexually explicit, and unsuited to age group


8. Uncle Bobby's Wedding, by Sarah S. Brannen. Reasons: homosexuality and unsuited to age group


9. The Kite Runner, by Khaled Hosseini. Reasons: offensive language, sexually explicit, and unsuited to age group


10. Flashcards of My Life, by Charise Mericle Harper. 
Reasons: sexually explicit and unsuited to age group

2. The Geography of Book Bans and Challenges, 2007-2009

The ALA has put together a handy map showing reported incidents of book banning at schools and public libraries. They estimate this is just a fraction of the actual bans that occur, but it's pretty interesting to look at your state or even city and see that something had been banned and you didn't even know it.

3. Excerpt from the ALA's "Free Access to Libraries for Minors"

Libraries should not limit the selection and development of library resources simply because minors will have access to them. Institutional self-censorship diminishes the credibility of the library in the community, and restricts access for all library users.

Children and young adults unquestionably possess First Amendment rights, including the right to receive information through the library in print, nonprint, or digital format. Constitutionally protected speech cannot be suppressed solely to protect children or young adults from ideas or images a legislative body believes to be unsuitable for them. Librarians and library governing bodies should not resort to age restrictions in an effort to avoid actual or anticipated objections, because only a court of law can determine whether material is not constitutionally protected.

The mission, goals, and objectives of libraries cannot authorize librarians or library governing bodies to assume, abrogate, or overrule the rights and responsibilities of parents and guardians. As Libraries: An American Value states, “We affirm the responsibility and the right of all parents and guardians to guide their own children's use of the library and its resources and services.” Librarians and library governing bodies cannot assume the role of parents or the functions of parental authority in the private relationship between parent and child. Librarians and governing bodies should maintain that only parents and guardians have the right and the responsibility to determine their children's - and only their children’s - access to library resources. Parents and guardians who do not want their children to have access to specific library services, materials, or facilities should so advise their children.

If that doesn't get you going, here's a video of some puppets banning books. Even puppets are getting into it now!

4. Puppet Book Banning

Happy Banned Book Week. Why not read a banned book today? - Jennifer

I've had a like-dislike relationship with Babar books since I first became aware of just what colonialism entails, and our nation's history with it. Casual readers of children's books may miss the political overtones of many of the books they read their children, but stories about a civilized, suit-wearing foreign king ruling over a nation of unenlightened monkeys is kind of hard to miss.

Thankfully, Adam Gopnick has written an essay for a new exhibition of the drawings of Babar's creators, Jean and Laurent de Brunhoff, that gives me the chance to revisit them with fresh eyes. From the New York Times:

The saga is not an "unconscious instance of the French colonial imagination," Mr. Gopnik writes, "it is a self-conscious comedy about the French colonial imagination." Jean de Brunhoff knew precisely what he was doing. Invoking the colonial world of the 1930s and France's mission of civilizing subjugated peoples, he was also satirizing that world, celebrating some things while being wary of others, knowing the need for civilization while also knowing the costs and inevitable failures that accompany it. [Link]

I can't speak to whether this reading of Babar will be a productive one, as I haven't gone back to the books yet. But I'm looking forward to doing so. Real connoisseurs can pick up the show catalog, with Gopnick's essay, for $50 from the Morgan Library and Museum. A hardcover edition of the six Babar stories by Jean de Brunhoff is on sale on Amazon.com for $20, down from $30. - Jeremiah