I never realized that there were "banned" books until I was in 11th grade. My Lit teacher told us that we were going to read classical books that were not on the banned list but we could read books on the banned list on our own outside of class! I asked after class what were "banned" books because I had no clue! I would have loved to have had access to the Internet at that time because I would have Googled "banned books."
I just heard that there is Banned Books Awareness Week, September 26- October 3. This is what Half Price Books has to say about this week: Speak freely. Write candidly. Read endlessly. Celebrate your First Amendment rights during Banned Books Awareness Week, September 26 - October 3. And remember that Half Price Books buys and sells anything ever printed or recorded, including banned and challenged books. We applaud the courageous authors who open our eyes to controversial topics.
Here is a list of the top 100 banned books as listed by 100bannedbooks .
1. 1984 by George Orwell
2. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1885) by Mark Twain
3. Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
4. Age of Reason by Thomas Paine
5. Andersonville (1955) by MacKinlay Kantor
6. Animal Farm by George Orwell
7. 1001 Arabian Nights by Geraldine McCaughrean
8. As I Lay Dying (1932) by William Faulkner
9. The Bastard by John Jakes
10. Beloved by Toni Morrison
11. Black Beauty by Anna Sewell
12. Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo A. Anaya
13. Blubber by Judy Blume
14. Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
15. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
16. Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
17. Call of the Wild by Jack London
18. Can Such Things Be? by Ambrose Bierce
19. Candide by Voltaire
20. Canterbury Tales by Geoffrey Chaucer
21. Carrie by Stephen King
22. Catch 22 by Joseph Heller
23. Catcher in the Rye (1951) by J. D. Salinger
24. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl
25. The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
26. Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau
27. A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
28. Color Purple by Alice Walker
29. Confessions by JeanbyJacques Rousseau
30. Christine by Stephen King
31. Cujo by Stephen King
32. Curses, Hexes, and Spells by Daniel Cohen
33. Daddy's Roommate by Michael Willhoite
34. A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Peck
35. Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller
36. Death in Venice by Thomas Mann
37. Decameron by Boccaccio
38. Dubliners by James Joyce
39. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
40. Fallen Angels by Walter Myers
41. Fanny Hill by John Cleland
42. Flowers For Algernon by Daniel Keyes
43. Forever by Judy Blume
44. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
45. The Goats by Brock Cole
46. Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell
47. Grapes of Wrath (1939) by John Steinbeck
48. Grendel by John Champlin Gardner
49. Hamlet by William Shakespeare
50. Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood
51. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone by J.K. Rowling
52. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets by J.K. Rowling
53. Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban by J.K. Rowling
54. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J.K. Rowling
55. Heather Has Two Mommies by Leslea Newman
56. House of Spirits by Isabel Allende
57. Howl by Allen Ginsberg
58. How to Eat Fried Worms by Thomas Rockwell
59. I Have to Go by Robert Munsch
60. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
61. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl
62. Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy
63. Jump Ship to Freedom by James Lincoln Collier and Christopher Collier
64. King Lear by William Shakespeare
65. Lady Chatterley's Lover by D.H. Lawrence
66. The Learning Tree by Gordon Parks
67. Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman
68. Lolita (1955) by Vladimir Nabokov
69. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
70. Lysistrata by Aristophanes
71. Macbeth by William Shakespeare
72. Merchant of Venice by William Shakespeare
73. Moll Flanders by Daniel Defoe
74. Monk by Matthew Lewis
75. Native Son by Richard Wright
76. Nigger of the Narcissus by Joseph Conrad
77. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
78. One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest by Ken Kesey
79. One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
80. Ordinary People by Judith Guest
81. Origin of the Species by Charles Darwin
82. Our Bodies, Ourselves by Boston Women's Health Collective
83. Portnoy's Complaint (1969) by Philip Roth
84. Private Parts by Howard Stern
85. Rights of Man by Thomas Paine
86. Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
87. Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
88. Separate Peace by John Knowles
89. Silas Marner by George Eliot
90. SlaughterhousebyFive by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
91. Song of Solomon by Toni Morrison
92. Sons & Lovers by D.H. Lawrence
93. The Story of Little Black Sambo by Helen Bannerman
94. Tarzan of the Apes by Edgar Rice Burroughs
95. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
96. Tropic of Capricorn by Henry Miller
97. Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare
98. Ulysses by James Joyce
99. Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe
100. Wrinkle in Time byMadeleine L'Engle
I found a great site that goes into why books are banned. Go to Delete Censorship for more information. Some books stay on the list. Others get added or deleted over time.
Motivation to ban a book stems from an individual feeling that their family values, religion, political views and or minority rights are being threatened. From there they just gather supporters and up it climbs the chain to get it banned. If you don't like the book for whatever reason then don't read it. Simple as that. FYI- The Harry Potter Books are the #1 most challenged books of the 21st century!
My opinion is that as a mother there might be books that I do not want my children to read. I do not feel a need to impose that on every child in America. As I looked over this list I see may books my daughters have already read. Some of the books on the list we are reading for High School Literature! This is something we will be discussing as we read and study together.
Posts
