Celebrate Banned Books Week

It amazes me that in this day and age, people are STILL trying to control what other people - other adults - can and cannot read. And, in fact, I don't want anyone telling me what me children can and cannot read, either; I want to make that decision for myself.

So, this is "Banned Books Week." And, in honor of the celebration, I'm going to read a banned book. Slaughterhouse Five is one of my favorite Vonnegut books of all time, and I keep it on my library shelf. It's on the list of books that have been banned. I plan on reading it tonight. What about you? Which of these books have you read, that you have enjoyed and perhaps learned a lot from, that someone would have wanted to prevent you from reading? From the ALA website, HERE;

"According to the Office for Intellectual Freedom, at least 46 of the Radcliffe Publishing Course Top 100 Novels of the 20th Century have been the target of ban attempts. The titles below represent banned or challenged books on that list."

1. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald 2. The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger 3. The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck 4. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee 5. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker 6. Ulysses, by James Joyce 7. Beloved, by Toni Morrison 8. The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding 9. 1984, by George Orwell 11. Lolita, by Vladmir Nabokov 12. Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck 15. Catch-22, by Joseph Heller 16. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley 17. Animal Farm, by George Orwell 18. The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway 19. As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner 20. A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway 23. Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston 24. Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison 25. Song of Solomon, by Toni Morrison 26. Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell 27. Native Son, by Richard Wright 28. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey 29. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut 30. For Whom the Bell Tolls, by Ernest Hemingway 33. The Call of the Wild, by Jack London 36. Go Tell it on the Mountain, by James Baldwin 38. All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren 40. The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien 45. The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair 48. Lady Chatterley's Lover, by D.H. Lawrence 49. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess 50. The Awakening, by Kate Chopin 53. In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote 55. The Satanic Verses, by Salman Rushdie 57. Sophie's Choice, by William Styron 64. Sons and Lovers, by D.H. Lawrence 66. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut 67. A Separate Peace, by John Knowles 73. Naked Lunch, by William S. Burroughs 74. Brideshead Revisited, by Evelyn Waugh 75. Women in Love, by D.H. Lawrence 80. The Naked and the Dead, by Norman Mailer 84. Tropic of Cancer, by Henry Miller 88. An American Tragedy, by Theodore Dreiser 97. Rabbit, Run, by John Updike