Nicholas J. Karolides, "Literature Suppressed on Political Grounds: Literature Suppressed on Political Grounds"

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Nicholas J. Karolides, "Literature Suppressed on Political Grounds: Literature Suppressed on Political Grounds"

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The aim of this volume is to spotlight some 400 works that have been censored, banned, or condemned because of their political, social, religious, or sexual content. The entries, which include a summary, censorship history, and brief bibliography, range widely from Aristotle through Galileo and on up to Adolf Hitler and Judy Blume. Such well-known prohibited works as de Sade's 120 Days of Sodom, the Communist Manifesto, and Huckleberry Finn are included here, but so are many other works that are now less controversial, e.g., Milton's Areopagitica and Uncle Tom's Cabin. Some of the censorship histories are several pages long, but others are very short; Born on the Fourth of July gets only 50 words. Though most of the works are worth notice, too many describe fairly vapid objections: Fail-Safe was challenged by a school librarian who thought the book would undermine "America's confidence in their defense system." But as one might expect, many of the entries, such as the one for The Satanic Verses, are harrowing. Prepared by well-qualified scholars who have written and lectured extensively on censorship, the set is a very readable gathering of much useful information. It provides more depth and is more current than either Anne L. Haight's Banned Books (1978. 4th ed.) or ALA's Banned Books Resource Guide (1995).he phrase suppressed on political grounds casts a shadow of a heavy-handed government blocking its citizens from receiving information, ideas, and opinions that it perceives to be critical, embarrassing, or threatening. This image, unfortunately, is too often reality. It is not, however, limited to dictatorships such as those of Adolf Hitler’s Nazi Germany, Joseph Stalin’s Communist Soviet Union, Suharto’s Indonesia, Augusto Pinochet’s Chile and Sani Abacha’s Nigeria. The political turbulence of the 1990s dismantled several of these, establishing more open government in Indonesia, Chile, Nigeria, and Russia. The governments of democracies, however, also participate in attempts to censor such critical material in order to protect their own perceived state security. Indeed, repression of freedom of expression is a significant operative factor in South Africa of the apartheid era, in pre-1990 South Korea, in Turkey, in postcommunist Ukraine, and recently in Russia. It is a factor, as well, in the United Kingdom and the United States today.

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Nicholas J. Karolides, "Literature Suppressed on Political Grounds: Literature Suppressed on Political Grounds"

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