The award for “Most Ironic Case of Book Banning” in history goes to Ray Bradbury’s “Fahrenheit 451.” Ironic because the book’s subject matter is–well, the banning of books and other forms of censorship.
“Fahrenheit 451” is a story set in the future and tells the story of Guy Montag. As the story opens, Montag’s profession is the burning of illegally-owned books. But as the story progresses, our “heroes” starts to question the value of his job to society. Eventually he steals a book from a collection that he is sent to burn. I won’t tell you the whole story, but by the novel’s end, the hero has seen how important it is that we have free expression in our society, and that people be free to read or listen to the controversial ideas of others.

So why was Bradbury’s novel so controversial? Why did people want to burn a book about book-burning? Keep in mind, this novel was first published in 1951. This was a time when paranoia about Communism was running rampant, and patriotism was praised–and expected. Pro-Communist material was routinely banned from libraries and bookstores. To attack the practice of book-banning was perceived by some as an expression to keep those Communist books in print.

Incidentally, perhaps the greatest irony of all is that author Bradbury has stated repeatedly that he never meant the book as a commentary about book-burning. Rather, the author says it was a commentary about television replacing books in people’s lives.

As I’ve been writing articles for this site, on many occasions, I’ve run into a quote that seemed almost right for a particular article. But then, for some reason or other, I always seem to decide against including it. So now, I’ve got a whole collection of quotes by noted individuals on the subject of book-burning, just waiting to be used. So let’s use them. Here, then, is my collection of Famous Book-Banning Quotes.

“The dirtiest book of all is the expurgated book.”
– Walt Whitman

“There is no such thing as a moral book or an immoral book. Books are well written or badly written. That is all.”
– Oscar Wilde, the Picture of Dorian Gray, 1891

“The books that the world calls immoral are the books that show the world its own shame.”
– Oscar Wilde, the Picture of Dorian Gray, 1891

“Adam was but human – this explains it all. He did not want the apple for the apple’s sake, he wanted it only because it was forbidden. The mistake was in not forbidding the serpent; then he would have eaten the serpent.”
– Mark Twain

“All censorships exist to prevent anyone from challenging current conceptions and existing institutions. All progress is initiated by challenging current conceptions, and executed by supplanting existing institutions. Consequently the first condition of progress is the removal of censorship.”
– George Bernard Shaw, Preface to Mrs. Warren’s Profession

“Censorship reflects a society’s lack of confidence in itself. It is the hallmark of an authoritarian regime…”
– Justice Potter Stewart, dissenting Ginzberg v. United States, 383 U.S. 463 (1966)

“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

Lest you think otherwise, it’s not just right-wing fanatics trying to ban books from our libraries and schools. On the liberal side, there has been a real fight in recent years to ban books that promote the idea of Biblical creation. There have been too many instances to mention them all, so let’s use just one prominent one to illustrate this fact.

“Grand Canyon: A Different View” is a 2003 book that offers an alternative view of how the Grand Canyon was formed. Since its publication, it has been the object of a book- banning effort by prominent evolutionists, who have demanded that the Grand Canyon National Park Service remove the text from bookstores within the park.

In the book, author Tom Vail collected essays from 23 contributors (most of whom hold earned doctorates in science). His book presents a creation science viewpoint of the Canyon’s formation that is quite different than what most Canyon visitors are told.

Creation scientists present evidence that the Grand Canyon was formed not by the slow erosion of the Colorado River over millions of years, but by a lot of water over a short period of time.

The controversial “Grand Canyon: A Different View” has been on sale at the Canyon’s bookstores since autumn of 2003. It quickly raised the ire of the presidents of seven science organizations, who jointly signed a December 16 2003 letter to the park’s superintendent urging him to remove the book.

But sales of the book argued differently: Since its original publication, the book has sold out and is being reordered, the Los Angeles Times reported. To date, the book remains available at the store. But maybe not for long.

As I was doing some research recently, I ran across an old newspaper article from 1999. This article suggested that, at least then, some people objected to the teaching of some of William Shakespeare’s plays in school.

It was a November, 1999 edition of The Savannah Morning News that told about a teacher at the Windsor Forest High School who required seniors to obtain permission slips before they could read “Hamlet,” “Macbeth,” or “King Lear.” It seems the teacher’s school board had pulled the books from class reading lists, citing “adult language” and references to sex and violence. Ironically, parent groups–who have initiated many book-ban attempts–protested the school’s policy, which also included the outright banning of three other books.

And this was not the first time for such action. According to a 1996 Associated Press article, Merimack, New Hampshire schools pulled “Twelfth Night” by Shakespeare because a woman dresses as a boy in the book. Similarly, have argued for pulling the sonnets, because (unknown to many), most of them were written to a male lover.

Shakespeare has been no stranger to censorship. As early as the 1600s, Richard II was censored. The play’s first edition had a scene that showed the deposition of Richard II, which made Queen Elizabeth so angry she ordered that part stricken from all copies. Also, a passage in Henry V featuring a comic character named Captain Jamy was possibly censored during King James I’s reign, while a reference to a Scottish lord was also removed from The Merchant of Venice. Finally, passages referring to Denmark in Hamlet were censored as well, probably for fear of offending Anne of Denmark.

FORTUNATELY, 500 YEARS LATER, RESPONSIBLE PARENTS ARE KEEPING AN EYE OUT, TRYING TO ENSURE THE BARD’S RIGHTFUL PLACE IN OUR CHILDREN’S EDUCATION.

I was shocked recently when I saw on Wikipedia that one of the most-banned books in the United States is a treasure by Matthew Hansen called “Beautiful Regard.” I guess it hurts more when it’s a book you’ve read and come to love. I want to save for later in this article the reason for it’s being banned. First, let’s talk about what the book is about.

As the title suggests, “Beautiful Retard” is about the mentally handicapped. Specifically, it documents in specific detail the challenges they face in getting through a typical day in the 21st Century. It’s a novel, to be sure, but based on the author’s experiences in dealing with persons with mental handicaps.

As for the reason it’s banned: According to Wikipedia, it’s because of the word “retard” in the title. Never mind that this is a word that has often been used to describe the mentally-challenged–and therefore is historically accurate. Never mind that the author clearly has only positive things to say about these people, and does not himself think of them as “retards.” We have become so politically correct in this culture that the mere use of a word that people actually use is reason enough to prohibit others from reading an otherwise-outstanding book.

Not convinced it’s been “banned?” Then I challenge you to try to find it. Look for it on the 3 big booksellers’ websites: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Borders. You’ll find it referenced at Amazon, along with readers’ positive comments about the book. But the book itself is unavailable for purchase.

Meanwhile, over on the Borders and Barnes & Noble sites, these two mammoths in the book industry that seem to have every insignificant volume ever published don’t even have any hint that this book ever existed. So you better check out your local library. If the PC police haven’t gotten to them already, this might be your only chance to read a book that truly does a service to the mentally-handicapped community.

On this website, we’ll discuss scores of books that have been the objects of censorship all over the world. But we begin with a practice that through the centuries has come to symbolism censorship more than anything else: that of book-burning.

This practice, of lighting a large outdoors bonfire and burning books (and records and pictures) is more about the statement it makes than getting rid of the books. Just as flag-burning is seen as an anti-American statement, burning a book is a way of telling the world that this book is not fit for public consumption.

Wikipedia traces the practice of book-burning back to China’s Quinn Dynasty of the 3rd Century B.C. Originally, book-burnings were mostly conducted by political authorities in order to suppress dissenting views. Such was the case when Quinn ordered all philosophy books from other states burned.
Wikipedia’s claims notwithstanding, we should note that even before Quinn, there is an example of a government-ordered burning found in the pages of the Old Testament. Jeremiah 36 says that Judah’s King Jehoiakim took offense at words of Scriptures and had scrolls that were read in his presence cut into pieces and cast into a fire.

Another notable example, several centuries later, was a book-burning ordered by Theophilus of Alexandria. In the fourth century A.D., Theophilus ordered that the library of the Serapeum should be burned because of books that could stir up the citizenry. Also at Alexandria, at the famed Library of Alexandria, one of history’s largest wholesale book-burnings occurred around 640.

In later times, religious groups picked up the practice of book-burning more so than governments. Martin Luther’s translation of the Bible was burned in 1624, and Catholic leaders in 1787 burned a new hynn book that offended more conservative Catholics. The reason: the hymns were in German rather than Latin.

Book-burnings continue in the 20th century, although they are largely relegated to fringe religious groups or to Muslim countries.

We’ve heard about books that cause religious or political controversy being banned. But comic books? It’s happening more often these days. Perhaps the case that best symbolizes this practice happened about a year ago at the Marshall Public Library in Marshall, Missouri.

At the time, the library had about 75 “graphic novels” (a kind of sophisticated and larger comic book) in its collection. These graphic novels, like other novels, are placed in either the adult, teen or kids’ sections as their content warrants. “Fun Home” was one of the offending graphic novels pulled from the Marshall Library’s shelf. The book tells the story of growing up as a lesbian with a gay father. It was placed in the adult section.

The other book was “Blankets,” an autobiographical graphic novel about the author’s Christian childhood. This one, which portrayed Christianity negatively, was found in the young adult section.

A patron saw the books and filed a complaint. The library pulled the books, but has since formed a committee to evaluate which books are — and are not — appropriate to have on their shelves.

Of course, this is not the first time that comic books have come under fire. The problem in recent years, however, has been determining who a comic book is for. Traditionally, they have been seen as reading material for children. However, in the past decade, hundreds of comics for adult readers have hit the bookstores and libraries. Parents worry that their kids might consider them children’s fare. The answer, of course, is for parents to be more involved in the material they allow their children to read–not in censoring the books they don’t want their kids to read.