Banned Books Week, 22-28 September

It's Banned Books Week - and it might surprise you to find out some of the many books that have been banned at one time or another. University of Strathclyde has a list of children's titles with explanations about when, where and why they fell foul of censors. It's divided into Young upstarts and Teen trouble and contentious kids. There's also a section on Controversial classics (adult books which are taught in secondary schools) and suggestions for further reading. Before you look at it, here's a book from each section. Try to guess why each one was banned!

 

Next week is packed with book events!

Next week is packed with book-related celebrations. It's Children's Book Week from 1st - 7th October - follow the link for posters (see illustration, left, by Rebecca Cobb) and resources. This year's theme is "Heroes and Heroines".

In the same week falls National Poetry Day - Thursday 4th - for which the theme is "Stars". There are lots of Star poems on the official site and the Scottish Poetry Library has some fabulous posters to download. Even though I am no longer working in an Education Library I intend to put some of those up. No reason why agriculture students should not enjoy a good bit of poetry!

Next week is also Banned Books Week. This is a US event, but books can be challenged in this country too, sometimes for very unexpected reasons. The University of Strathclyde has an excellent reading list Banned: controversial books for teenagers and children which is worth investigating for more information. As Oscar Wilde said: "There is no such thing as a moral or immoral book. Books are well written, or badly written, that is all." Do you agree?

Finally, an ongoing event to bring to your attention is the exhibition Take Five Illustrators at the Scottish National Gallery which features Alice Melvin, Cate James, Barroux, Sara Ogilvie and Bruce Ingman, all of whom work on books for children. It's been on all summer and finishes on 30th October, so there's still time to catch it. No excuses, then, not to do something book related next week - there's plenty to choose from!

Is teenage fiction "rife with depravity"?

A lot of controversy has been stirred up by an article in the Wall Street Journal by Meghan Cox Gurdon, entitled Darkness too visible, in which she asks "contemporary fiction for teens is rife with explicit abuse, violence and depravity. Why is this considered a good idea?" I'm not sure I would describe the teen books coming into this library in those terms, although as the books she cites are American I couldn't judge any of them apart from Suzanne Collins' Hunger games trilogy which I''ve blogged about (approvingly) here. I've now noticed quite a few rebuttals coming through, one of which is from another writer on her own paper, Christopher John Farley, whose blog post asking Should young adult books explore difficult issues? comes up with a "Yes", as does another blog post from Not just for kids. Today, the Guardian has joined in with an article on its Teen Books page and a plea Don't censor teen fiction on its Books Blog. The controversy has also spawned its own Twitter tag, #YAsaves.

If you want to explore teenage books and the issues involved through our pages, see the one on Teenage Literature and our Banned Books reading list which deals with titles for all ages which have caused controversy over the years.

It's Banned Books Week

We're in the middle of Banned Books Week which launched on 25 September and is a celebration of the freedom to read. It originally started in America in 1982 as a reflection on the rise in challenges faced by libraries, bookstores and schools regarding the content of books. The Banned Books week site has lists under various headings:

• Corrosive to young minds
• Politically incendiary
• Downright sexy
• Just wrong

We also have our own page, Banned: controversial books for teenagers and children, which covers similar ground:

• Young upstarts: books written for younger children
• Teen trouble and contentious kids
• Controversial classics
• Further reading

You will probably be surprised at some of the titles included! Here's just a taster: