Banned Books throughout History

Banned Books Week serves as a reminder that there are efforts underway to pull “questionable” books off of library shelves. The campaign was started in 1982 by activist Judith Krug, who was an avid first amendment and library activist. Banned Books Week is held in the last week of September in the United States and is also celebrated by Amnesty International. The events goal is to “teach the importance of our First Amendment rights and the power of literature, and to draw attention to the danger that exists when restraints are imposed on the availability of information in a free society."

Some notable books that have been on the ban list for the context of the literature have been: A Day No Pigs Would Die by Robert Newton Peck which highlights the honest approach of the brutality of pig farming, American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis which contains scenes that are graphic enough to be banned from a lot of libraries and its release protested by Gloria Steinem for violence against women and All Quiet on the Western Front which was banned in Nazi Germany for being demoralizing and insulting to the Armed Forces of Germany. 

This coming week however, in celebration of Banned Books Week, Mark Twain’s “Eve’s Diary” will be unbanned. The trustee of Charlton Library in Massachusetts, Richard Whitehead, stated “On Tuesday, September 20, 2011 the board of library trustees unanimously voted to unban Eve's Diary. I think that Mark Twain would be very pleased and I'm sure that he would have something humorous to say about it.”