Amph America's most banned books. 1 - Huh?

I think everyone here has grown accustomed to the often absurd reasonings for some of these book bans. If anything this one seems too obvious given the title (TWO mommies, and no daddy ).

 

what's up next?

 

17. A Day No Pigs Would Die- Robert Peck

[image=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/85/A_Day_No_Pigs_Would_Die.gif]

The novel is focused around the boy developing a strong bond with his father, a butcher who slaughters hogs, and his pet pig named Pinky, and is set in the fictional town of Learning, Vermont. Robert Newton Peck uses his own childhood as a Shaker to reveal the problems Robert faces growing into manhood. For example, he helps his neighbor's cow have two baby bulls and saves one's life, while risking his. As reward his neighbor gives him his prized pet pig. As the pig grows to maturity it turns out to be sterile, though otherwise ideal. Eventually the family faces such economic hardship that Pinky is slaughtered. The slaughter and butchering of Pinky is extremely graphic, but accurate. The boy assists his father in this act, holding his beloved pet down while his father kills and makes sausage out of it.

The book takes place roughly during the Calvin Coolidge presidency. The novel is loosely based on Peck's own life, though there is much dispute about the accuracy of known information about Peck's childhood.



How dare we tell our kids the realities of where meat comes from.

 

yeah, shocking

 

Ban-worthy? No.

Bloody and gory as hell (perhaps excessively so)? Definite yes.

Excessively depressing and miserable? Check.

Redeeming quality? Uhhh...teaches kids that their lived don't suck as much as they think?

The only thing that I learned, reading the book at age 12, was that Shakers are a cruel, cold, irredeemable people with barbaric practices and lifestyles.


I know a thing or two about the slaughter of animals, and I've never seen nor hear of a method of killing an animal for food that even came close to the wanton brutality, sheer sadism, and thorough perversity of the manner in which they kill the pig. There was no bullet between the eyes, or slitting of the throat, or even hanging the animal upside down and gutting it while it is still alive (a common contemporary American practice). No, they slowly beat the animal to a bloody pulp until it had stopped squealing and was near death, then clubbed its' face with a bat until the skull had been crushed.

 

A fascinating insight, Edward, thank you


16. Halloween ABC- Eve Merriam


Award-winner Merriam slips on a Gothic cloak and mask to titillate and tease with 26 varied Halloween poems, highlighting all letters of the alphabet, that playfully and ironically address readers. The book offers "guises, disguises, all kinds of surprises" in fresh, original creations. In prominently musical and rhythmic verse, the versatile poet invites kids to wrinkle their noses, squeeze crow's feet into the corners of their eyes and smile knowingly. Illustrator Smith is a perfect accomplice with his wickedly eerie paintings of squat goblins and yellow-eyed witches, tattered umbrellas and other bedeviled images.

According to Wikipedia "Her book Inner City Mother Goose was described as the most banned book of the time." Although that book doesn't appear on this list.


So, yet another book about Halloween falls foul of a complete lack of knowledge and understanding

 

If they don't ban "The Gashleycrumb Tinies", then what's the big deal about this one?

 

Up!

 

15. Revolting Rhymes - Roald Dahl


Revolting Rhymes is a collection of Roald Dahl poems published in 1982, that re-interpret popular fairy tales. The poems are illustrated by Quentin Blake.


There are a total of six poems in the book.

In 'Cinderella', one of the ugly stepsisters switches her shoe with the one Cinderella left behind at the ball. However, when the prince sees whom the shoe fits, he decides not to marry her, and instead cuts off her head. When the prince removes the head of the second stepsister and makes to do the same to Cinderella, she wishes to be married instead to a decent man. Her fairy godmother grants this wish and marries her to a simple jam-maker.

In Jack and the Beanstalk, the beanstalk grows golden leaves towards the top. Jack's mother sends him up to fetch them, but when Jack hears the giant threaten to eat him, he descends without collecting any of the gold. Jack's mother then ascends herself, but is eaten. Undeterred, Jack decides to bathe, and then climbs up and collects the leaves himself as the giant was unable to smell him after he had bathed. Now rich, Jack resolves to bathe every day.

Snow White and the Seven Dwarves begins familiarly, but after the huntsman agrees not to kill Snow White, she takes a job as a cook and maid for seven jockeys in the city. The jockeys are compulsive gamblers on horseracing, but are not particularly successful. Snow White resolves to help them, and sneaks back to steal the magic mirror, which can correctly predict the winning horse and makes the seven jockeys (and Snow White) millionaires, with the moral that "Gambling is not a sin / Providing that you always win".

Goldilocks describes the criminal activities of a wench who ransacks the house of a family of bears - stealing food, breaking antique furniture, and soiling their freshly made beds with her muddy feet. Instead of escaping, the title character is eventually eaten as a punishment for these transgressions.

In Little Red Riding Hood and the Wolf, the wolf enters the grandmother's house and devours her before putting on her clothes in order to eat Little Red Riding Hood next. Riding Hood is not disturbed however, and calmly pulls a pistol out of her knickers and shoots the wolf ("The small girl smiles/Her eyelid flickers/She whips a pistol from her knickers/She aims it at the creature's head and BANG! BANG! BANG! she shoots him... dead.") - yielding her a new wolfskin coat.

In The Three Little Pigs, the wolf quickly blows down the houses of straw and sticks, devouring the first two pigs. The third house of bricks is too strong, so the wolf resolves to come back that evening with dynamite. The third pig has other plans, however, and asks Little Red Riding Hood to come and deal with the wolf. Ever the sharpshooter, Red Riding Hood gains a second wolfskin coat and a pigskin traveling case.

 

We discussed these rhymes back in the fairy tales thread a few months back. They're awesome, and thankfully they weren't banned in my school library.

They're all available in animated format on YouTube:
Cinderella
Jack and the Beanstalk
Snow White and the Seven Dwarves
Goldilocks
Little Red Riding Hood
The Three Little Pigs

 

I guess they were afraid the kids would die laughing.

 

I don't know any kid who didn't enjoy Roald Dahl books. The rhymes were brilliant!

 

"Gambling is not a sin, as long as you always win" didn't play in Peoria, I guess. Though for sheer perversity, I think "The 3 Little Pigs" wins.

I have a little niece, just born, and her I shall suborn
With rhymes perverse, from the Universe
Of Roald Dahl, that literary curse
Of parents all.

It's catching!

 

"Whips a pistol from her knickers" is like the best frigging line I've heard in a long time.

 

Thesebooks are very adaptable as plays in schools, we did Snow White when I was in grade 4 and I was the mirror.

 

"Then (this is the disgusting part), the Queen sat down and ate the heart."

"I only hoped she cooked it well; boiled heart can be as tough as hell."

 

Love Roald's rhymes!

 

I went online to get a copy...

 

A couple of years ago I wrote a paper for an English exam where I examined the difference in gender roles in the oldest printed version of Little Red Riding Hood (Perrault) as well as Dahl's excellent adaptation from this book.

I'm proud to say I got an A.

 

I'm not surprised.

 

14. Blubber - Judy Blume

Blubber is a young adult novel by Judy Blume first published in 1974. The protagonist is Jill Brenner, a Pennsylvania fifth-grader who joins her classmates in ostracizing and bullying Linda, an awkward and overweight girl. Linda gives an oral class report about whales and is hence nicknamed "Blubber" by her peers.

Basic plot - Linda gets bullied, then she doesn't, then she ends up a loner. So this realistic moral of the story is that sometimes bullys win.

 

*Sometimes*?

 

Blume wasn't Shakespeare or anything, but if all YA literature was as intelligent and realistic as Blume's, the world would probably be a better place.

 

Has Deenie been on this list yet?

 

13. How to Eat Fried Worms - Thomas Rockwell


10-year-old Billy must eat fifteen worms in fifteen days to win a bet. His friends help him by preparing the worms in a variety of ways to make them more appetizing. The story continues in its sequel, How to Fight a Girl.

It was later turned into a CBS Storybreak episode in the mid-1980s, and a movie of the same name in 2006. Because the novel's content--the idea of eating worms as part of a bet--is thought to be disgusting by some, it has been the frequent target of censors.

Particular content in the book has been censored among various editions as well; Seventies editions of the book included a single use of the phrase "you're a [illegitimate child]," which was replaced with "you're a fink" in later editions.