Not long ago, the American Library Association compiled alist Top 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books: 2010-2019. 

As the ALA  explains:“The American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) hasbeen documenting attempts to ban books in libraries and schools since 1990. OIFcompiled this list of the most banned and challenged books from 2010-2019 byreviewing both the public and confidential censorship reports it received.”

I’ve read 39 books on this list of 100. True, most of thebooks I’ve yet to read are recently (within the last five or so years)published.  I’m really looking forward toreading The Hate U Give, by Angie Thomas.

Some of the classics, like George Orwell’s 1984, LoisLowry’s The Giver, Alice Walker’s The Color Purple, and most certainly TheAdventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain and To Kill a Mockingbird byHarper Lee, I’ve read more than once. In fact, I’ve read Twain and Lee severaltimes, I once considered Huck Finn and Scout my best friends. And I had a bitof a crush on Tom Sawyer.

How many have you read from the list?

“[Banned books] are stories that encourage kids to think forthemselves, to learn about themselves, to understand that there are peopledifferent from them in the world and that’s not only okay, it’s fascinating.[…]

Books create compassion; they create safe spaces whereempathy is developed, and every time you ban a book you are taking away thatlesson from a kid. We are not protecting children from salacious material — weare removing the tools that we give them to make sense of a world that is veryconfusing and difficult for a lot of kids.” – Jodi Picoult ( Books, Beaches andBeyond Podcast )

In a more recent compilation, ALA highlights the  Top 10 Most Challenged Books of 2024:  

As ALA explains, “The 2024 data reported to ALA’s Office forIntellectual Freedom (OIF) shows that the majority of book censorship attemptsare now originating from organized movements. Pressure groups andgovernment entities that include elected officials, board members andadministrators initiated 72% of demands to censor books in school andpublic libraries.”

Of this list, I’ve read four.  How many have you’ve read?

“I believe that censorship grows out of fear, and becausefear is contagious, some parents are easily swayed. Book banning satisfiestheir need to feel in control of their children’s lives. This fear is oftendisguised as moral outrage. They want to believe that if their children don’tread about it, their children won’t know about it. And if they don’t know aboutit, it won’t happen.” – JudyBlume

Tony Marx, the NYPL President, explains it much moreeloquently: 

“What so many misunderstand about banning a book is that therepercussions stretch way beyond the book itself. We're not being dramatic whenwe say that banning a book is the first step toward erasing not just someone'swork, but their humanity, and their surrounding culture. 

Put another way, if you don't think a person's perspectiveshould be allowed on a bookshelf, and if you're so afraid of what they have tosay and who they might be that you want to silence them and hide them from yourchildren, you are one move closer to treating them as if they don't exist orshouldn't. It's the first step on a journey toward ignorance, hate, andall-too-real violence."

Reading has always played an important role in my life. Infact, I can’t remember a time when I wasn’t reading something.  In the early grades, I skipped the boringpicturebooks and went straight for the good stuff: Lassie, Black Beauty andGentle Ben.  I read The Yearling and OldYeller and Where the Red Fern Grows, drowning in my own tears with every read.I loved everything with pirates, and dreamt of finding treasure on an island. I wanted to be a part of Robin Hood's merry 'gang.' My favorite Musketeer was Athos, and I rooted for Moby Dick. I wanted to be one for all with the Baker Street Irregulars. I was the geekreading Charles Dickens and Mark Twain. By eighth grade, I was reading LOTR. Thesebooks kept me company at a time when I needed friends. These books made theworld make sense when everything was upside down. These books also let me knowthat dreams were possible.

By the way, in honor of Banned Books week, Lorin Oberwegerand Free Expressions is offering a list of titles you might want to checkout via her little bookstore on Bookshop.org. Use code: BBW25 to get 20% offand strike a small blow for freedom of expression! (Any proceeds go to fundingscholarships for Free Expressions webinars and workshops.) There are manyexcellent books here, for readers and writers! 

S o tell me, why do you read?

And by the way, thank you for reading!

-- Bobbi Miller