Read Banned Books

Its quite an irony that every year attempts are being made to ban/challenge several of the literary classics. Be it George Orwell's 1984 or J.D. Salinger's Catcher in the Rye, or Heller's Catch 22 or Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind - these books are being challenged/banned for several reasons (mostly stupid). And the primary reasons for being challenged/banned are::

• Institutions (Schools/students/community etc.),
• Initiator (Parents/Religious Organizations/Government etc)
• Type (sex/adult content etc.)

For e.g. few of my favorite books being banned for stupid reasons are:

• The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger for sexual content, offensive language and being unsuited to age group;
• The Chocolate War by Robert Cormier for sexual content and offensive language;
• Whale Talk by Chris Crutcher for racism and offensive language

ALA (American Library Association) is celebrating 25th year of Banned Books Week (Sep 23-30, 2006) and Google Books has joined their hands to bring some of these banned books to people. Get the list of available banned books on Google Books here. Read ALA's president post in Google Blog | Learn more about the banned books here