Every year, the American Library Association (ALA) hosts Banned Books Week, to bring attention to censorship and some of the amazing books that are often its victim.

For reference, the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books from 1990-2000.

“An idea that is not dangerous is unworthy of being called an idea at all.” – Oscar Wilde

I’m sure very few will miss the Goosebumps series should they be pulled from shelves, but the fact that most of these are re-instated in American public libraries restores my faith in the future of children’s education and literacy. Were the holes in the shelves left by the absence of some of these remain unfilled, they would spell out ‘literary crisis’.

My advice? Check out the list, remember and appreciate the ones you have read and find some to read while you still have access to them

Here’s a brief list of books that strongly shaped me, have piqued my interest and/or have been added to my contraband reading list:

3. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
4. The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier
5. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
6. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
13. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger
14. The Giver by Lois Lowry
17. A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Newton Peck
37. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
39. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison
41. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
43. The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton
47. Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
52. Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
56. James and the Giant Peach by Roald Dahl (who could refuse a child the simple joy of Roald Dahl?)
57. The Anarchist Cookbook by William Powell
62. Are You There, God? It’s Me, Margaret by Judy Blume
65. Fade by Robert Cormier
66. Guess What? by Mem Fox
69. Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut
70. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
84. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

And you thought we lived in enlightened times.

(Other ALA books banned from at various times include 1984, The Diary of Anne Frank, Fahrenheit 451, Twelfth Night, Ulysses, and the list goes on…)

This entry is filed under books.