This year’s Freedom to Read Week took place from February 20 – 26 and there is no better time to think about and honour our freedom to read! Similar to Banned Books Week in the U.S., Freedom to Read Week encourages Canadians to think about and reaffirm their commitment to intellectual freedom, which is guaranteed them under the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

This topic has been weighing on my mind lately as news reports out of the States mention more and more books being banned in student classrooms. While this is not a new or novel idea, as book banning goes together with the concept of books themselves, it has definitely been something that I have been thinking about lately.

There are a multitude of reasons for wanting a book to be removed but the most prevalent ones according to NBC News are from parents and politicians who want to “ban books dealing with race, sexuality and gender from schools” and in some cases, libraries. This has also resulted in some school librarians pre-emptively pulling diverse titles from their shelves. This quieter form of banning is called “soft censorship”, and authors invited to talk at school events about these books found themselves with “invitations revoked, administrators talk to them about what they will say to the students, and rumors of parental objections. They also faced the very real possibility that their identities or the LGBTIA+ stories keep their titles off school shelves and booklists, and prevent the authors from being invited to schools or events. There’s no public discussion: they just aren’t even considered” (School Library Journal, 2020).

As someone who has worked with children and is passionate about letting children read what they would like to read, these stories of censorship always tug at a sore spot in my heart. I am a firm believer that children can identify for themselves what they are or are not comfortable reading about and it is our job as adults to help make sure that if there is something they would like to learn about, they have access to this information. The School Library Journal article above also points out that access to these books can be life-saving, as students turn to books to feel reassurance as they read about children who are similar to them or who are experiencing the same things. As one of my favourite authors Jason Reynolds says about book banning, “I just think that people should understand that at the end of the day, we as adults, we claim that we want our children to grow up to be better than we are and in order to do so they must have the information that we did not have. So to stop that information really makes us all hypocrites and it’s something that we should be thinking about” (Intellectual Freedom Blog, ALA, 2022).

If you are concerned about book banning here at Vaughan Public Libraries, our Collection Policy is actually quite robust and it accounts for the intellectual freedoms of our customers. I think these sentences summarize it best: “The library recognizes the right of any individual to object to using certain library materials for personal use. VPL does not accord to any individual the right to restrict the freedom of others to make use of that same material”. Even while I personally may not be fond of a certain title, I still recognize that having access to said title is a right and that is one of the central pillars of public libraries. If for any reason a customer feels an objection is necessary, we do have a process by which we register formal complaints.

If you would like to learn more about intellectual freedom or more about this issue, please consult the Freedom to Read Week website, the American Library Association’s Banned and Challenged Books website and my colleague Karen’s post from last year that even more eloquently explains this issue. And because this would not be one of my usual posts without it, here is a short list of a few of the books that have been banned or challenged, and all books that I highly recommend:

Maus by Art Spiegelman: this graphic novel is widely regarded as one of the best novels of all time and for good reason. In this biographical story, Maus “recounts the chilling experiences of the author’s father during the Holocaust, with Jews drawn as wide-eyed mice and Nazis as menacing cats” (from the publisher’s description). It is critically acclaimed by all readers, not just ones who prefer to read comic books, for its honesty. It has been banned in some schools that have deemed the content too unpleasant for children but as the author says “This is disturbing imagery. But you know what? It’s disturbing history.”

All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M. Johnson: I swear I have included this book in many past blog posts and for good reason! This is one of my favourite memoirs for teens and I think that it is so important that adults and teens alike read this book. The book has been banned from schools in several states in the U.S. as the book does have depictions of sexuality but the author themself makes it clear that the novel is geared for teens aged 14 and up and that the book does so through the angle of sexual education, “I am talking about consent. I am talking about agency. And I am using my story to teach kids about the mistakes that I made the first time that I was having sex, so they don’t make those same mistakes. I am teaching kids about not feeling guilty when sexual abuse happens, and how to recognize sexual abuse—most teens don’t even recognize they’ve been abused. And how to fight back against those traumas that you can hold on to for so very long. So they’re leaving very, very important context out, intentionally of course, to try and say my book is pornographic.” (Interview with George M. Johnson, The New York Times, 2021).

Melissa (formerly titled George) by Alex Gino: This chapter book is one that I never hesitate to recommend because not only does it have a great depiction of the life of a trans child but it also shows readers that books are never static and they are always changing. The novel stars Melissa, a young trans girl who wants to break out of her shell and star in the school’s play for Charlotte’s Web. The title for the novel has been changed last year to honour Melissa’s true name.

However you chose to honour Freedom to Read week this year, I hope that you look into more banned books and add some to your reading list. Sometimes there is nothing more satisfying than reading something that someone else doesn’t want you to. Interestingly, I am not the only one that thinks so as books that are banned tend to see an increase in sales.