Banned Book Recommendation Thread

[CleverNickName]

It's a new school year here, where I live. And a new school year means a new school board, which means a new list of "banned books." Not sure why; it seems to be a favorite pastime of newly-elected school board members here.

So recommend your favorite BANNED BOOK to me. It should be a book that you have read, that you have enjoyed, and is/was banned in the city, county, state, or country where you live. If you have more than one favorite, make more than one recommendation!

This is not the place to discuss, debate, or even casually mention politics. Don't even think about it. We are here to talk about books and censorship, not politics. You know the rules, so follow them.

 

[Smackpixi]

When I was I HS (90s) I often did my homework in the public library with some friends cause other kids (ie girls at other HS in town) did the same. And since I have no ability to focus on things for very long I’d often just wander around the library (again, kinda hoping to find an excuse to stumble into a girl looking for the same thing I wasn’t actually looking for) and one day I found a book that was a history of book banning up to about 1992. And it wasn’t that interesting, mostly classics, the top three BY FAR were Go Ask Alice, Catcher In The Rye and Huck Finn.

my time was before all the fuss about queer stuff, mostly because there wan’t that much queer stuff in the library, maybe Giovanni’s Room, which was probably on the list but way down cause homosexuality wasn’t out enough then to hate on.

I feel like Go Ask Alice is a fun forgotten banned book to check out. I can’t believe anyone cares about it anymore. It’s a book about a teenage girl in the early 70s? that does drugs and has sex with boys and I don’t recall it exactly working out so well for her, I think it’s a pretty terrible book, but that it addressed the subject matter of sex and drugs to a teenage audience is why the book was persecuted.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

In Southlake, TX- a D/FW suburb not far from me- Life is Good by George Dawson was recently banned… at George Dawson Midfle School. That’s right, they banned a book written by the man whose name graces the building.

Book banned at a school named after its author | Boing Boing

The book Life is So Good, co-written by George Dawson, is banned at George Dawson Middle School in Southlake, Texas. The same George Dawson who wrote this book is the George Dawson the school is na…

boingboing.net

 

[Zardnaar]

I lose not sure if we've banned any books. Some films decades ago.

 

[Kobold Stew]

V, by Tony Harrison.

V is a poem, and also a short film, and it is one of the most moving and searing examinations of class and the place of poetry in human life that I know. I first saw the film in 1990 as part of a "Banned on the BBC" series on the UK's Channel 4. The poem had been debated in Parliament, condemned by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and banned from British school curricula and from broadcast.

It is one of the greatest poems I know.

Tony Harrison, Yorkshire poet, discovers his ancestral tomb has been defaced by a football hooligan with a letter V. (V for victory, for versus, for verses). He imagines a conversation with him, giving an educated and articulate voice to the random act of violence. It is a beautiful poem that rhymes the ugliest words in the English language in ways that are unexpected and sublime. In doing so it also re-imagines Thomas Grey's Elegy in a Country Churchyard.

(I live in Canada now, so the choice is a bit of a cheat, but nothing else from the 20th c. comes close for me.)

 

[jdrakeh]

To Kill a Mockingbird, which has been banned in many places, is not only an excellent book but also a contender for best work of fiction penned in the 20th century.

 

[Dioltach]

V, by Tony Harrison.

V is a poem, and also a short film, and it is one of the most moving and searing examinations of class and the place of poetry in human life that I know. I first saw the film in 1990 as part of a "Banned on the BBC" series on the UK's Channel 4. The poem had been debated in Parliament, condemned by the Archbishop of Canterbury, and banned from school British curricula and from broadcast.

It is one of the greatest poems I know.

Tony Harrison, Yorkshire poet, discovers his ancestral tomb has been defaced by a football hooligan with a letter V. (V for victory, for versus, for verses). He imagines a conversation with him, giving an educated and articulate voice to the random act of violence. It is a beautiful poem that rhymes the ugliest words in the English language in ways that are unexpected and sublime. In doing so it also re-imagines Thomas Grey's Elegy in a Country Churchyard.

(I live in Canada now, so the choice is a bit of a cheat, but nothing else from the 20th c. comes close for me.)

I'd forgotten that V was banned. Tony Harrison is an amazing poet; The School of Eloquence always has me bawling my eyes out.

 

[Mezuka]

Some of Tintin's (Congo 1931) and Asterix's (The Great Crossing 1975) graphic novel adventures. Which I loved as a young boy.

A women managed to get 5000 copies of (similar) books removed in an Ontario Catholic school board. She went as far has doing a video cleansing ceremony in which she burned copies, to be shown in class. She turned out to be an imposter and not indigenous at all. Several First Nations chiefs of Canada said they did not agree with her behaviour.

They do contain some 'racist' depiction elements. Which is a very good reading opportunity for children in schools (or at home) to talk about how our society has evolved and what is no longer acceptable. The school board issued an apology.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/indigenous-peoples-commission-resignation-1.6168910

 

[Aeson]

Maus was a big one last year. I'm sure they're still after those daggum messes.

 

[Ryujin]

Maus was a big one last year. I'm sure they're still after those daggum messes.

Was thinking the same, but didn't know if OP would consider graphic novels to be "books" for this context.