Celebrate Banned Books Week!

September 25-October 2

Banned Books Week (BBW) is an annual event celebrating the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment. Held during the last week of September, Banned Books Week highlights the benefits of free and open access to information while drawing attention to the harms of censorship by spotlighting actual or attempted bannings of books across the United States.

Intellectual freedom—the freedom to access information and express ideas, even if the information and ideas might be considered unorthodox or unpopular—provides the foundation for Banned Books Week. BBW stresses the importance of ensuring the availability of unorthodox or unpopular viewpoints for all who wish to read and access them.

The books featured during Banned Books Week have been targets of attempted bannings. Fortunately, while some books were banned or restricted, in a majority of cases the books were not banned, all thanks to the efforts of librarians, teachers, booksellers, and members of the community to retain the books in the library collections. Imagine how many more books might be challenged—and possibly banned or restricted—if librarians, teachers, and booksellers across the country did not use Banned Books Week each year 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.

Banned Books Week is sponsored by the American Booksellers Association; American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression; the American Library Association; American Society of Journalists and Authors; Association of American Publishers; and the National Association of College Stores. It is endorsed by the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress.

For more information on getting involved with Banned Books Week: Celebrating the Freedom to Read, please see Calendar of Events and Ideas and Resources. You can also contact the ALA Office for Intellectual Freedom at 1-800-545-2433, ext. 4220, or bbw@ala.org. (From the ALA website: http://www.ala.org/ala/issuesadvocacy/banned/bannedbooksweek/index.cfm)

The following books are some of the books that have been challenged. They are currently on display and available for checkout at Hackley Public Library.

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings By Angelou, Maya 2002-03 - Random House 9780375507892 Check Our Catalog In the first volume of an extraordinary autobiographical series, one of the most inspiring authors of our time recalls--with candor, humor, poignancy and grace--how her journey began.... "From the Trade Paperback edition. …More

The Great Gatsby By Fitzgerald, F. Scott 2004-10 - Scribner Book Company 9780743273565 Check Our Catalog The authorized text which restores all the language of Fitzgerald's 1920's classic story of the fabulously wealthy Jay Gatsby and his love for the beautiful Daisy Buchanan. …More

Summer of My German Soldier By Greene, Bette 2003-03 - Dial Books 9780803728691 Check Our Catalog World War II has come to Patty Bergen's hometown of Jenkinsville, Arkansas, in the form of a German prisoner of war camp. Patty, a twelve-year-old Jewish girl, is curious about these Nazi soldiers, who must be monsters for the killing they have done. She is also lonely and awkward, and looking for a friend. Anton, a German soldier, is not the monster that Patty imagined, but a frightened young man with feelings not unlike her own. He sees Patty in a way no one else does, as "a person of value." When she decides to help him escape from the camp, the consequences will change Patty's life forever. This thought-provoking, emotional narrative tackles difficult issues with insight and courage. Patty's story is as important today as ever, and has made Summer of My German Soldier a modern classic. It is a National Book Award Finalist, an ALA Notable Book, and a New York Times Outstanding Book of the Year. …More

Kite Runner By Hosseini, Khaled 2004-04 - Riverhead Books 9781594480003 Check Our Catalog Alex Award Winner - 2004 Winner - 2004 ALA Notable Fiction Selection A BookPage Notable Title An epic tale of fathers and sons, of friendship and betrayal, takes readers from Afghanistan in the final days of the monarchy to the atrocities of the present. As emotionally gripping as it is tender, The Kite Runner is an unusual and powerful debut. …More

Their Eyes Were Watching God By Hurston, Zora Neale Afterword by Gates, Henry Louis, JR. Foreword by Danticat, Edwidge 2008-02 - Harperluxe 9780061470370 Check Our Catalog Fair and long-legged, independent and articulate, Janie Crawford sets out to be her own person-- no mean feat for a black woman in the '30s. Janie's quest for identity takes her through three marriages and into a journey back to her roots. …More

Brave New World By Huxley, Aldous 1998-09 - Harper Perennial 9780060929879 Check Our Catalog A fantasy of the future that sheds a blazing critical light on the present-- considered to be Aldous Huxley's most enduring masterpiece. …More

To Kill a Mockingbird By Lee, Harper 1988-10 - Warner Books 9780446310789 Check Our Catalog The unforgettable novel of a childhood in a sleepy Southern town and the crisis of conscience that rocked it, To Kill A Mockingbird became both an instant bestseller and a critical success when it was first published in 1960. It went on to win the Pulitzer prize in 1961 and was later made into an Academy Award-winning film, also a classic. Compassionate, dramatic, and deeply moving, To Kill A Mockingbird takes readers to the roots of human behavior-to innocence and experience, kindness and cruelty, love and hatred, humor and pathos. Now with over 15 million copies in print and translated into forty languages, this regional story by a young Alabama woman claims universal appeal. Harper Lee always considered her book to be a simple love story. Today it is regarded as a masterpiece of American literature. …More

Beloved By Morrison, Toni 2004-06 - Vintage Books USA 9781400033416 Check Our Catalog Staring unflinchingly into the abyss of slavery, this spellbinding novel transforms history into a story as powerful as Exodus and as intimate as a lullaby. Sethe, its protagonist, was born a slave and escaped to Ohio, but eighteen years later she is still not free. She has too many memories of Sweet Home, the beautiful farm where so many hideous things happened. And Sethe's new home is haunted by the ghost of her baby, who died nameless and whose tombstone is engraved with a single word: Beloved. Filled with bitter poetry and suspense as taut as a rope, Beloved" is a towering achievement. …More

The Catcher in the Rye By Salinger, J. D. 1991-05 - Little Brown and Company 9780316769488 Check Our Catalog Holden, knowing he is to be expelled from school, decides to leave early. He spends three days in New York City and tells the story of what he did and suffered there. …More

Of Mice and Men By Steinbeck, John 1993-09 - Penguin Books 9780140177398 Check Our Catalog A Great Books Discussion Selection Tragic tale of a retarded man and the friend who loves and tries to protect him. With illustrations from the movie starring John Malkovich and Gary Sinise. …More

Adventures of Huckleberry Finn By Twain, Mark 1994-05 - Dover Publications 9780486280615 Check Our Catalog Join Huck and Jim as their boyhood adventures along the Mississippi River lead them into a world of excitement, danger, and self-discovery. Humorous narrative, lyrical descriptions of the Mississippi valley, and memorable characters. …More