Too Political
Spoils of War - John Tirman
aram
In 2005-06 Fatih Taş, the owner of Aram publishing house, was charged with insulting the Turkish military and the memory of Atatürk, for his publication of a translation of a 1997 book by John Tirman, entitled: “Spoils of War: The Human Cost of America’s Arms”. In “Spoils of War”, Tirman criticises US foreign policy for having militarised the US allies in the Middle East by selling them weapons, and thus preventing them from carrying on domestic democratic reforms. According to the author, the Turkish military used these weapons against the Kurds in the 1990s, thereby in his views committing human rights violations on a massive scale.
Non-fiction, Non-fiction, Translation
The Communist Manifesto - Marx and Engels
Penguin
The Manifesto was issued by Marx in 1848, and is regarded as founding document of Communism. Since its publication this book has been banned, burned and censored in many capitalist countries because of its political content.
Non-fiction, Non-fiction
Lysistrata - Aristophanes
penguin
Banned in the US in 1873, and in Greece by the Nazis in 1942, and by the military junta in 1967. Lysistrata is an account of one woman's mission to end The Peloponnesian War - she convinces the women of Greece to withhold sexual privileges from their husbands and lovers as a means of forcing the men to negotiate peace. If only all the wars could be solved by a sex strike...
Non-fiction, Classic
We - Yevgeny Zamyatin
Penguin (UK)
D-503, a resident of One State, lives with his fellow citizens in condition of 'mathematically infallible happiness'. When he decides to keep a journal, we are taken with him on a journey into forbidden realms of love and rebellion. This dystopian novel and satire on state control was banned on its publication in Russia in 1921 for political reasons.
Fiction, Classic, Modern classic
Wild Pigeon - Nurmuhemmet Yasin
Books on Demand Gmbh (Sep 2008)
This is an allegorical story of a young pigeon who is the son of a dead king. One day the pigeon takes a journey looking for a new home for his flock, when he is trapped by humans. Instead of giving up his freedom, he chooses to die. Yasin first published his short story in the bi-monthly Uighur-language Kashgar Literature Journal, issue No. 5, November 2004. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison for "inciting Uighur separatism" for the publication of the book. Chinese authorities consider the story to be a tacit criticism of their government in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region, and therefore banned the book.
Fiction, Short stories
The Adventures of Tom Sawyer - Mark Twain
Vintage classics
Alongside Huckleberry Finn, this book has attracted controversy for its use of racially charged language. In fact, this novel of a young boy growing up along the Mississippi River not only raised important questions of racial inequality that are still with us today, but revolutionised modern American story telling into the bargain.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
Areopagitica - John Milton
Dodo Press
Areopagitica is among history's most influential and impassioned philosophical defences of the principle of a right to freedom of speech and expression. Little suprise, then, that Areopagitica was banned under the very act it rallied against in the midst of the English Civil War.
Non-fiction
The Awakening - Kate Chopin
Vintage
This seminal work of early feminism centers around Edna Pontellier and her struggle to reconcile her increasingly unorthodox views on femininity and motherhood with the social attitudes of the southern US states in the 1900s. It faced challenges from the moment of its release in the US, due in part to its treatment of gender roles, but also for its depiction of female sexuality.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille
Borstal Boy - Brendan Behan
Arena Books
It is believed that the Irish Censorship of Publications Board banned the novel in 1958 due to adolescent sexuality, questionable language, and critiques of Irish republicanism, social attitudes and the Catholic Church. The censorship board was never asked to explain its decision.
Non-fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille
Burger's Daughter - Nadine Gordimer
Bloomsbury
Banned in South Africa in July, 1979 for going against the government's racial policies; the ban was reversed in October of the same year. Burger's Daughter tells the story of white anti-apartheid activists in South Africa seeking to overthrow the South African government.
Fiction
Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut
Penguin
Like many Vonnegut novels, Cat's Cradle tackles numerous issues, such as the nuclear arms race and religion. In 1972, the Strongsville, Ohio School Board banned the book without stating an official reason. Notes from the meeting include references to the book as 'completely sick' and 'garbage.' However, this ban was overturned in 1976.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Talking book
The Colour Purple - Alice Walker
Phoenix
The Colour Purple received the 1983 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction, but that hasn't stopped it being a target for censors. Taking place mostly in rural Georgia, the story focuses on female black life during the 1930s in the Southern United States, addressing the numerous issues including their exceedingly low position in American social culture. It was banned in a Californian School for its troubling ideas about race relations, God and sexuality, and its violent content.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print
Death of a Salesman - Arthur Miller
Penguin
Miller's 1949 play examines and attacks the notion of the American Dream. In this Pullitzer Prize winner, he accuses America of selling a false myth built around capitalist materialism, and in so doing attracted the attention of the House of Un-American Activities Committee. However, it is on charges of profanity that the play has been banned in some US schools, and due to Miller's campaigning for the freedom of dissident writers that it was banned, along with the rest of his work, in the USSR in 1969.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
Dr Zhivago - Boris Pasternak
Vintage
Most people think of Doctor Zhivago as a love story. But this sweeping epic tells us much about the Russian revolution and its aftermath. It was banned in the USSR until 1988 for its underlying criticism of the Bolshevik party.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury
Flamingo
This is a book about censorship, set in a future where fireman are employed to burn books which are considered to cause depression. Ironically it was banned in an American school during Banned Books Week for it’s explicit language and questionable themes .
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
The First Circle - Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
Harper Perrenial
The First Circle was banned in the Soviet Union for the negative portrayal of Joseph Stalin. In this highly autobiographical novel, Solzhenitsyn depicts the lives of the occupants of a sharashka (a R&D bureau made of gulag inmates) in the Moscow suburbs. Many of the prisoners are technicians or academics who have been arrested in Stalin's purges following the Second World War.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Germinal - Emile Zola
Wordsworth Classics
A book about the conditions of mines in northeast France and dealing with the social concerns of the working class, for which it was seen as radical for the time of its publication in 1885. It was attacked by right-wing groups for inciting revolution and the Vatican made it prohibited reading for Catholics.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Gone with the Wind - Margaret Mitchel
Pan Books
Everyone's heard of Scarlett O'Hara and Rhett Butler, surely? But whilst this book and the film it spawned have become a world-wide best sellers, the novel has also been banned in the past in various US states for containing racist language.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
The Gulag Archipelago - Alexandr Solzhenitsyn
Harper Perrenial
In this three-volume book, the author uses eyewitness testimony, primary research material, and his own experiences as a prisoner in a gulag labour camp to inform the reader about the Soviet forced labour and concentration camp system. Banned in the Soviet Union because it went against the image the Soviet Government tried to project of itself and its policies. However, it was available to the public in the Soviet Union since at least the 1980s, and in 2009, the Education Ministry of Russia added The Gulag Archipelago to the curriculum for high-school students.
Non-fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
Vintage
In Heart of Darkness, Conrad seeks to expose the dark side of Belgian colonisation of the Congo, by focusing on one of the largest acts of genocide commited up to that time. Its violent content, and use of the word 'nigger' have seen it banned from many US schools.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
Invisible Man - Ralph Ellison
Penguin
Ellison's novel addresses many of the social and intellectual issues facing African-Americans in the early twentieth century, including black nationalism, the relationship between black identity and Marxism, and the reformist racial policies of Booker T. Washington, as well as issues of individuality and personal identity. Its use of profanity, violence and sexual imagery led to parents of some US school children to request its removal from their libraries.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille
The Jungle - Upton Sinclair
Penguin
Sinclair's portrayal of the poverty and hopelessness of immigrants working in the American meatpacking industry of the early 20th century sought to expose the corruption of those in power at the time. Instead, it seemed to draw more attention to food safety standards than to the plight of the workers. It was banned in Yugoslavia, burned in Nazi Germany for its socialist themes, yet banned in East Germany in 1956 for being incompatible with Communisim.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Talking book
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
Bloomsbury
This tale of young people growing up through turbulent times in Afghanistan, with its coverage of paedophilia, rape, Nazism and sadism and strong language thrown in for good measure – all taking place in a Muslim country - was bound to create controversy. Its portrayal of characters from particular Afghan ethnic groups caused the film adaptation to be banned on the grounds that racial violence might ensue.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
The Metamorphosis - Franz Kafka
Vintage
Metamorphosis was banned by both the Soviet and Nazi regimes. Kafka's story is of a young man who, transformed overnight into a giant beetlelike insect, becomes an object of disgrace to his family, an outsider in his own home, a quintessentially alienated man. It was banned in the Soviet Union for being both decadent and despairing.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck
Penguin
Offensive and vulgar language; profanity; racism; sexism; promoting euthanasia and being anti-business are all accusations brought against this American classic, and it is often on the American list of the most censored books in schools.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
Penguin
One Hundred Years of Solitude tells the story of the rise and fall, birth and death of a mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family. Despite winning the Nobel Prize for literature, a number of US schools had it excluded from their curricula.
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
The Rights of Man - Thomas Paine
Dover
The Rights of Man proposes that popular political revolution is permissable when a government does not safeguard its people, their natural rights, and their national interests. It was banned in the UK, and the author was charged with treason for supporting the French Revolution, and later banned in Tsarist Russia after the Decembrist revolt.
Non-fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Tintin in the Congo - Herge
Egmont Books Ltd
Herge rejected accusations of racism by claiming he was simply portraying the naïve, colonialist views of the time. But the African characters seemed to have exaggerated physiognomies and to be ignorant. The book has been redrawn over the years but challenges to bookshops and libraries still occur. Borders moved its copies to the adult section prompting sales to grow to the point where it was their fifth highest selling title. Depictions of a hunted rhinoceros being blown up were also removed.
Fiction
Uncle Tom's Cabin - Harriet Beecher Stowe
Wordsworth Classics
Banned in the southern United States during the Civil War due to its anti-slavery content, and also in 1852, in Russia under the reign of Nicholas I due to the idea of equality it presented. It was also felt that it "undermined religious ideals."
Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Wealth of Nations - Adam Smith
Penguin
Banned in the UK and France for criticizing Mercantilism. Banned in communist nations for its capitalist content.
Non-fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Wild Swans - Jung Chan
Harper Perrenial
This memoir covers 3 generations of a Chinese family. Published in 1991 it proved to be hugely popular in the Western world and received critical acclaim but is still banned in China.
Non-fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn - Mark Twain
Oxford paperback
Huck Finn has been banned at various times; sometimes for its left wing associations, sometimes (mistakenly) for its RIGHT! It has come in for a lot of criticism in recent years because it makes frequent use of the word "nigger", (by both black and white characters in the book) and the casual observer might mistake this for racism on the authors part. In fact nothing could be further from the truth, as Mark Twain's whole tenor is anti-slavery and anti-racist. The word "nigger" in the context of mid 19th Century Mississippi was simply the vernacular for "Negro". Twain was a close personal friend of Harriet Beecher Stowe, who was cited by President Lincoln as one of the prime movers in the anti slavery movement.
Fiction, Children's fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
Animal Farm - George Orwell
Penguin
This book powerfully demonstrates the importance of democracy and freedom of speech. It is still relevant today with its tale of corruption and misinformation in a worker's revolution that goes wrong. In the 1940s, Allied forces found the book critical of the USSR, and therefore considered too controversial to print during wartime. A play of Animal Farm was banned in Kenya in 1991, because of its criticism of corrupt leaders. In 2002 it was banned in schools in the United Arab Emirates.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
Vintage
A dystopian fictional world where women's only function is to breed. It was no.37 on the American Library Association's 100 most frequently challenged books 1990 - 2000 - challenged because it was claimed to be anti-Christian and pornographic.
Fiction, Science Fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
July's People - Nadine Gordimer
Bloomsbury Publishing PLC
The book is about a white family living in South Africa who suddenly find themselves in a new South Africa where the blacks have taken over and they are forced to flee their house in the face of violence. In their flight they end up in the village of their one-time servant and end up living with him and his family in the village. "The plot of the book is interesting in its role reversal of black/white South Africans and the upstairs/downstairs dichotomy. I also enjoyed the open ending of the book and how the characters never truly became comfortable within their new roles in the new black South Africa and the fact that it seemed that even the black South Africans prefered the seeming stability of white ownership and rule." Marie, Lambeth Libraries The book was banned in South Africa before the Apartheid as the government felt that it predicted accurately what might happen to South Africa.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Talking book
All Quiet on the Western Front - Erich Remarque
Vintage
Banned in Nazi Germany for portraying the Wehrmacht (German military forces) in a bad light. A sad and brilliant book - fully deserving its classic status - the story is told from the perspective of a young German at the time of the First World War.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
For Whom the Bell Tolls - Ernest Hemmingway
Arrow
The New York Times called it 'The best book Hemingway has written'. This evocation of the pride and the tragedy of the civil war that tore Spain apart tells the story of a young American volunteer who is sent blow up a bridge behind the lines of Franco's army. In the mountains he finds the dangers and the intense comradeship of war - and he discovers Maria. This book was banned in Spain during Franco's rule due to its pro-Republican views.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
The Unbearable Lightness of Being - Milan Kundera
Faber
This philosophical novel centres around the lives of a man and two women in 1968 Prague. This thought provoking book was banned in Kundera's home county of Czechoslovakia until 1989 due to its depiction of life under Communist rule.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Nineteen Eighty-Four - George Orwell
Penguin
Published in 1945, it was banned in the USSR until the 1980s for its allegorical depiction of the rise and fall of socialism and Stalin's totalitarian regime. Ironically it was also banned in the US for having communist text in the introduction.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
The Master and Margarita - Mikhail Bulgakov
Penguin
The Devil and his retinue arrive in Soviet Moscow and all sorts of trouble ensue. This satire on Soviet society was banned in the USSR until 1973.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Talking book
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz - L Frank Baum
Penguin Classics
Timeless children's classic about Dorothy, Toto, and the friends they make in Oz. This book has been banned by many libraries in different American states for different reasons - in the South because of witches being referred to as 'good' and under McCarthyism for its perceived socialist values.
Fiction, Children's fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book
Persepolis - Marjan Satrapi
Vintage
Oliver at ARTICLE 19 recommends Marjan Satrapi's book 'Persepolis': "It has become a hit everywhere in the world except Iran where it is banned. Readers of the book may also like to read Azar Nafisi's 'Reading Lolita in Tehran' which is banned in Iran too."
Fiction, Biography, Translation
The Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck
Penguin
The Grapes of Wrath focuses on a poor family of sharecroppers in the Great Depression. It follows them as they are driven from their home in Oklahoma by drought, hardship, and changes in the agriculture. They set out for California along with thousands of other "Okies" in search of land, jobs and dignity. When it was published in 1939, this book was banned and burned in many places in the US for its social and political views. "Steinbeck is one of my favourite authors and this is perhaps his best known work. It seems incredible that some wanted to ban such a great classic for political reasons, and therefore it is a very good example of the need to resist the banning of books." Karl, Brent Libraries, Arts & Heritage.
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Alexander Solzhenitsyn
Penguin Classics
The story is set in a Soviet labour camp in the 1950s, and describes a single day of an ordinary prisoner, Ivan Denisovich Shukhov. Banned in the USSR for political reasons. The author was sent into exile.
Fiction, Classic, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
Black Beauty - Anna Sewell
Puffin
With more than fifty million copies sold worldwide, Black Beauty is one of the best-selling books of all time. It extols the virtues of kindness and respect. It was banned by the South African government during the Apartheid era because of the word 'Black' in the title.
Fiction, Children's fiction
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Giant print, Talking book
A Prayer for Owen Meany - John Irving
Black Swan
Banned in some US states for its views on religion and criticism of the US government for the Vietnam War & Iran-Contra. This book tells the story of John Wheelwright and his friend Owen Meany growing up together in a small town in New England, in the 1950s and 60s. Its a mystical book - Meany believes he is an instrument of God, to be redeemed by martyrdom - but full of comedy. Essential banned reading!
Fiction, Modern classic
Also available in the following formats: Braille, Talking book