Banned Books Week

Exercise Your Freedom - Read a Banned Book This Coming Week

"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind. Were an opinion a personal possession of no value except to the owner; if to be obstructed in the enjoyment of it were simply a private injury, it would make some difference whether the injury was inflicted only on a few persons or on many. But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error." — On Liberty, John Stuart Mill

I didn't really know there was a Banned Book Week until I read this morning's issue of the Chesterfield PATCH - it piqued my interest. The American Library Association has some interesting history on banned and challenged books over time, including a list of Frequently challenged books of the 21st century Run on over to their website and check it out along with lots of other interesting facts about the banning and challenging of books over time.

Here is a list of Radcliffe's Rival 100 Best Novels , forty-six books on that Best Novels list also made it to the list of Banned and/or Challenged Books

Here is just a sample from the top of the banned and/or challenged list, you may have heard or even read some of them:

1. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
2. The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
3. The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
4. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
5. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
6. Ulysses, by James Joyce
7. Beloved, by Toni Morrison
8. The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
9. 1984, by George Orwell

Do something novel this next week - read a banned book.