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Banned Books Week Events at Baldwin Librarynicholas-schrock-allstate
(BPL Press Release, Sept. 18, 2014)
The number one challenged book in 2013 was a series: Captain Underpants by Dav Pilkey. A children’s series about fourth graders whose fictional superhero accidentally becomes real, the Captain Underpants series has had the honor of being the most challenged book in America for two years running. With the most challenges reported, this wildly popular children’s book series beat out the controversial Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. oakland115 reikiJames for the title. These rankings reflect information reported to the American Library Association (ALA), which documents formal, written complaints submitted to schools and libraries across the country requesting that material be removed because of content or appropriateness.
The Baldwin Public Library supports intellectual freedom in its own community. Library Director Doug Koschik said, “I am proud that the Baldwin Public Library’s strategic plan lists intellectual freedom as one of the Library’s core values. It is vital for our society to give its citizens the freedom to express every possible viewpoint. Only by exchanging and debating a full range of ideas can people achieve what is best and most useful for them. Public libraries are forums where such debate and education take place.”
In this vein, the Baldwin Public Library is joining the ALA, the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, many other prestigious organizations, and libraries across the country in celebrating Banned Books Week seed09_jeannie_davisfrom September 21-27. This week uses the concept of book banning to draw attention to censorship and to celebrate the freedom to read.
Adults can participate by going on a “Blind Date with a Banned Book”. Check out a wrapped book at the Library and take a chance exploring a challenged book. You’ll even take home a little bag of Hershey’s kisses to enjoy on your date.
Teens can participate on Thursday, October 2nd at 7:00 p.m. by reading Persepolis: The Story of a Judy_Palmer30yearsChildhood by Marjane Satrapi as a part of a Special Banned Books Week book club. Then they can watch the movie at the Library on Thursday, October 9 at 6:30 p.m. Children can celebrate the Captain by attending our Captain Underpants Party on Tuesday, September 23 at 4:15 p.m.
Some of the Library’s Board of Directors, librarians, staff, and Friends of the Library have also participated by naming a few of their favorite books that have been challenged according to the ALA’s data:
Library Board of Directors: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
In My Mother’s House by Patricia Polacco
 
Librarians: Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (including Library Director, Doug Koschik)
The Giver by Lois Lowry
In the Night Kitchen by Maurice Sendak
A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
seed032sheryl_l_mitchell            Lord of the Flies by William Golding
The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald (including Associate Director, Kathryn Bergeron)
 
Staff: 1984 by George Orwell
The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
His Dark Materials trilogy by Philip Pullman
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest by Ken Keseywaterwork
           The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Brave New World by Aldous Huxley
 
Friends of the Library: The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Julie of the Wolves by Jean Craighead George
 
The Baldwin Public Library is located in downtown Birmingham at 300 W. Merrill Street and can be reached at 248-647-1700 or through the Library’s website at www.baldwinlib.org.