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Banned book reading

Doing some homework before the book arrives

Ordered the book last week, it should be arriving pretty soon as amazon has a distributor in Coffeyville, KS. I had no idea.:eek: Don't tell abecedarian, she'll probably camp out there until they open the doors or something.:rolleyes: ;)

Some interesting items to look at regarding Uncle Tom's Cabin

Wiki entry on Uncle Tom's Cabin

Clarence Page editorial on the twisting of Uncle Tom's reputation in latter years.

Prairie-Girl-I'm not certain how far you are from here, but Henson's famous cabin of refuge is in Dresden.

Personally, I'd love to make it out to Maryland and see Josiah Henson's cabin, where he lived as a slave. USA TODAY article.

One of the best quotes that I remember of Licoln's, is his comment to Stowe upon meeting her. "So this is the little lady who made this big war.":cool:
 
Preface & Chapter 1-Uncle Tom's Cabin

The USPS must've been working overtime, I got the books that I odered late last week today, holy cow!

The religious theme of this book is something I didn't know about previously. I knew a lot of christian groups such as the quakers were strong abolitionists. You have to give credit to John Brown and his followers, who helped to push the envelope against silent compromise and ignoring of the issue. The preface by Stowe is rich in this theme of progressive action, carried out under christian principles and belief, leading to the liberation of slaves and abolition of the "peculiar institution" as it was known.

I was really hooked into the first chapter reading. In some regads, I felt it should've been a "Mr. Smith goes to Washington" type of movie, it just had a way of pulling your heart strings. I can definitely see why the southern slave traders and owners hated Stowe with a passion.:D Mr. Shelby's description is similar to that of most of your good neighbors and people in your community. He is a kind hearted man and stands in stark contrast to Haley. I loved the description of Haley as a pretentious, "out there" person. The discussion of selling Jim was secondary in importance to Haley also wanting to buy out Harry, Eliza's son. The tension of the chapter clearly took place with Eliza stepping out and hearing her master and the trader conversing.

I had the feeling that Shelby was tricked into selling Tom and Harry, but it turns out he did it upon a simple reminde that he was in debt to Haley. The end of the chapter ended with Mrs. Shelby taking Eliza to task over believing that the Shelbys would ever sell Harry away from his mother. You just knew this was going to happen, again, a good heart-strings and righteous indignation moment.:mad:

I'm really enjoying the reading so far, I'm on chapter seven now, but I want to double-back and comment on those chapters later. What a simple, but compelling read!
 
Family of Preachers

SFG75 said:
The religious theme of this book is something I didn't know about previously.
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Harriet Beecher Stowe was the daughter of a famous preacher (Lyman Beecher) and married to a preacher-scholar (Calvin Stowe). All of her brothers were ministers, too numerous for me to remember.

I have read some of Stowe's other works (The Minister's Wooing, Old Town Folks) and she liked nothing better than a good religious exhortation worked into the plot somewhere.

That said, the New England abolitionists were motivated more by religious ideals than they were by abstract concerns for civil rights. They saw rights and souls as coming from God.
 
Chapters 2 & 3

Did some more looking around and found this interesting article on the christian roots of abolitionism.

Chapter 2 must have been very insulting to any southern slave holder who dared to pick up the book. the knuckle-wrenching, "this is horribly wrong" feeling just sweeps you over. The portrayal of George Harris's creativity and intelligence being crushed by a dumb slave owner made for a good read, though one that gets your blood pressure up.:D

The best portion regarding Harris was in chapter 3 IMHO. I just loved this part:

My master! and who made him my master? That's what I think of-what right has he to me? I'm a man as much as he is. I'm a better man than he is, I know more about business than he does; I am a better manager than he is; I can read better than he can; I can write a better hand,-and I've learned it all myself.....
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(page 15 in my book)

the miserly and evil nature of the owner further comes out in George's recounting of how the slave master forced George to drown his dog while they threw stones at it. Once again, attention grabbing.

Overall, I'm really enjoying the simple nature of the writing of this book. each character definitely has their own "voice." George's emphatic and up-beat tempo clearly comes out, ditto Haley's lazy southern drawl. I can't say that the other characters are easily as definable.:confused:
 
I was amused to realize that Ulysses banned :cool:
Whoever manages to read it should actually get a price and not get into a prison for breaking the law :D

And banning Lolita I find also strange. It is well-written and rather makes you dislike the main character, and be aware of that kind of adults.

Lord of Flies by Golding - the idea of the book is so striking and realistic. I could actually vividly imagine the things happening in reality. We all could have been like that under certain circumstances.

By the way, I found that some of the books were banned by US - is that correct? I always though that in US there is a freedom of speech - so how do the books get ever banned? What is the catch here? How does the actual law read?
 
The Gospel According to Jesus Christ

I've just payed attention that Amazon list of top 100 banned books did not include Saramago's
"The Gospel According to Jesus Christ" which was banned in his home, Portugal. I'd put it in the ten-top, actually, because it was so well written, and it is very "non-standard" book.

For Amazon, it is rather surprising not to include a book of a Nobel-prize winner in the top-100-banned, especially that it is a good book.
 
Freedom of Speech

The waveguide said:
By the way, I found that some of the books were banned by US - is that correct? I always though that in US there is a freedom of speech - so how do the books get ever banned? What is the catch here? How does the actual law read?
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The "law" is an amendment to the constitution which forbids Congress to limit freedom of speech. Private or non-national institutions like libraries and schools can ban a book, that is, refuse to have it or make it available. Sometimes they get away with it and sometimes they don't. Banning a book by stopping its publication is much tougher to do as in the case of the Pentagon Papers and these contentions often end up in court.
 
I always though that in US there is a freedom of speech - so how do the books get ever banned? What is the catch here? How does the actual law read?
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In the U.S., it depends upon who is doing the banning.:D As silverseason mentioned, stopping the publication of something is hard to do. The Pentagon Papers were an unflattering assessment of U.S. activity in Vietnam and contradicted all the bright and shiny stories the government was feeding the press about "victory is around the corner" and that kind of non-sense. The president cited "executive privilege," a doctrine essentially created by the Supreme Court which says that the president has some expectation of privacy. The reason was that the president's advisors need to speak with him frankly, they can't be expected to do so fully if they know their comments will eventually come out. The government lost the pentagon papers decision, as well as the executive privilege claim over the Nixon tapes. The court stated that when criminal wrong doing enters the picture, executive privilege is limited. You can read that fascinating discussion here.

In schools, a parent or two complain about a given book. Usually a study group is formed to assess the book and give a recommendation to the principal/superintendent. A decision can be handed down by the principal,though usually he/she gains the support of the superintendent and/or the board. The school board can handle the matter as well as they have the utlimate say over curriculum matters. Schools have an interesting time if one or more yahoos get on the board.:eek:

Private businesses don't have to carry certain books if they don't want to. Where my brother in law lives, a group of pastors and concerned citizens successfully got the gas stations to drop the selling of playboy and other skin magazines. That isn't a violation of the first amendment, as that amendment applies to the government censoring. City councils operates on a principle of "community standards" to a certain degree. I think that is more iffy constitutionally, but they've been successfulso far. Cases involving library censorship or restriction of computer access occurs as libraries take federal money, hence they fall under the scope of government support/involvement of censorship. If a library was privately funded, a lawsuit wouldn't last a day in court.
 
I think everyone should read Anne Rice's Sleeping Beauty trilogy. :p
(See 2nd list of Banned Books)
No. Seriously.
 
This ebook has been banned online more times than I can count, but it's true.

http:\\s216606257.websitehome.co.uk/1.html
 
Uncle Tom's Cabin-chapters 5 &6

This was an interesting chapter, I would term it-the southern white guilt chapter, but no one asked me.:p

. . .how can I bear to have this open acknowledgement that we care for no tie, no duty, no relation, however sacred, compared with money?
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There is a good degree of christian populism here, where Stowe decries the southern money changers and their worship of the almighty dollar. A couple of other good zingers:

It is a sin to hold a slave under laws like ours,. . .
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and

I don't want to hear such sermons; I never wish to hear Mr. B. in our church again. ministers can't help the evil, perhaps-can't cure it, any more than we can-but defend it!-it always went against my common sense.
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These passages to me are direct lightning bolts. A southern minister who would've read this book would've been red-faced with rage. I've read elsewhere that many of them felt that slavery was justified as some form of humanitarian patronage on the part of the whites towards the slaves. The infamous "Hamitic curse theory" is the ultimate Biblical retort. This declaration of slavery as a sin and that ministers are wrong, back then, wow-can't quite think of a modern day analogy of it. It's like someone arguing that your mother isn't a saint, but rather, the devil herself.;)

I liked chapter 6, not too much to look at there, other than the passive-aggressive slave who gets Haley bucked off his horse and tries to delay the hunting party for Eliza. Couldn't help but slilently root for them delaying Haley. I know, I know, it's fiction-but still. Sometiems yo ucan get a bit "too" into a book right?:rolleyes: :D
 
Banned Books I've Read

Animal Farm- George Orwell
The Witches- Roald Dahl
To Kill A Mockingbird- Harper Lee
Lord of the Flies- William Golding

I'd recommend all of these.

Also, it wasn't banned but censored (I'm pretty sure it wasn't banned):
A Clockwork Orange:
If you read this book, make sure its not the American version- they cut out the ending. The original ending (not shown in the movie either) is amazing and basically is the best part of the book, quite haunting actually and it really makes you think.
 
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