Who decides what our kids can read?
We’re surprised these books have ever been thought of as being unsuitable for children. Imagine the sad space they would create on our bookshelves if a few people had been successful in banning them. We don’t think our kids’ minds would be richer for it; in fact we think there would be a deficit in their little literary lives from being denied the unique point of view these books provide. And that doesn’t seem very pro-family to us.
And we’ve been wondering a lot lately what pro-family means.
We all know that the NLB recently banned And Tango Makes Three, and so we decided that pro-family, for us, doesn’t include letting other people decide what our kids can read. (It also doesn’t include letting our kids access Facebook, McDonalds and Miley Cyrus videos if we can help it, but we’re not out to get these banned). Because if it did, we would never have had the chance to share these 10 books, considered to be international classics, with our kids.
1. The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz by L. Frank Baum
This book has copped a beating in the US over several decades. First banned from all Chicago public libraries in 1928. A Florida librarian attempted to have it banned in the 50’s for being “unwholesome”. The director of the Detroit Public Library banned it in 1957 “for having no value for children of today”. Then in Tennessee in 1986, seven Fundamentalist Christian families opposed the book being included in the school syllabus because it featured ‘good’ witches and thereby promoted the belief that human attributes could be “individually developed rather than God given.” They also argued that all witches are bad, so it’s “theologically impossible” for good witches to exist.
2. Green Eggs And Ham by Dr Seuss
Banned in the People’s Republic of China in 1965 for its perceived portrayal of Marxism. The ban was lifted in 1991, following Seuss’ death.
3. The Rabbits’ Wedding by Garth Williams
This is a story about two rabbits that enjoy each other’s company. However, one of the rabbits is white and the other is black. In 1959, a US politician in Alabama demanded that the book be removed from libraries because of its perceived themes of racial integration and interracial marriage. The director of the Alabama State Library Agency reviewed the book and determined it was her ethical duty to defend the book against an outright ban. A battle ensued and eventually the book was placed on special reserve shelves to limit access. A library that defends books – now there’s a thought!
4. Alice In Wonderland by Lewis Carroll
Banned in 1931 by the Governor of Hunan Province in China on the grounds that “animals should not use human language, and that it was disastrous to put animals and human beings on the same level”.
5. Charlie And The Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
This book was initially challenged because the depiction of the Oompa Loompa’s was deemed racist. Then in Colorado, a librarian took it upon herself to lock the revised edition (that contained a more positive spin in the Oompa Loompas) in the reference collection because “the book espoused a poor philosophy of life”.
6. Harriet The Spy by Louise Fitzhugh
Critics attempted to ban this book in the 80’s because they believed it would teach children to lie, gossip, and curse.
7. Charlotte’s Web by E.B.White
In 2003 a Head teacher at a school in West Yorkshire in the UK removed all books that featured pigs so as to prevent any offence that it may cause to Muslim students. The Muslim Council of Britain called the move “well-intentioned but misguided” and requested the books be reinstated. On the other side of the pond in 2006, some parents in a school district in Kansas challenged the book for being blasphemous on account of the talking animals and also as “inappropriate subject matter for a children’s book”, due to its description of a spider dying.
8. Where The Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak
This celebrated book has been challenged by adults who basically don’t think kids are up to the task of dealing with dark emotions and unsettling feelings. Bruno Bettelheim (an author apparently well-respected for his psychoanalytical take on fairy tales), denounced the book in Ladies’ Home Journal as follows: “What’s wrong with the book is that the author was obviously captivated by an adult psychological understanding of how to deal with destructive fantasies in the child. What he failed to understand is the incredible fear it evokes in the child to be sent to bed without supper, and this by the first and foremost giver of food and security—his mother.”
9. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott
When this was published in 1868, it was challenged by some for being too progressive in it’s suggestion that women could choose what they want out of life. Then in the last century it was criticized because it “diminishes young women, panders to the ‘weaker sex’ mentality, and fails to empower girls to succeed.” Can’t win.
10. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
Commonly considered a great American novel, this classic was first banned in Massachusetts in 1885 for being “trash and suitable only for the slums.” Fast forward a bit and the American Library Association stated that it was the fifth most-frequently-challenged book in the US during the 1990s. In exploring the theme of racism, the novel has been deemed to be both racist and anti-racist. In an interesting turn of events, Louisa May Alcott (author of Little Women, a challenged book itself. See above. ), lashed out at Twain publicly, saying, “If Mr. Clemens (Twain’s original name) cannot think of something better to tell our pure-minded lads and lasses he had best stop writing for them.”
Is the world really a better place without And Tango Makes Three? How will you know?