This week, the ALA celebrates banned book week as an annual event to celebrate the freedom to read and the importance of the First Amendment.
The NAMW team would like to hear your stories regarding banned books. What has been your experience? Is there a time when you were personally affected? Do you have a favorite, “banned book” that you like to share with others? Can you imagine a particular book that if it were banned, would upset you?
When I was in Berlin, I stood next to the sculpture of some of the books that were thrown into the fire during the book burning under Hitler’s regime in 1933. Names like Freud, Jack London, Thomas Mann were etched on the books in the sculpture.
We all need to recognize the need to share our stories about the importance of books, and how much is lost when someone is silenced with the next generation of readers and writers. If we don’t teach them to recognize censorship and the dire results of it, who will?
