For the first book in a series about banned books, why not start with the penultimate book about book censorship? For a cautionary taste of a dystopian future, Fahrenheit 451 remains the go-to book for English teachers, sci-fi junkies, and Francois Truffaut. Since its publication in 1953, the book has ironically been cut and censored by editors hoping to remove swear words when including the text in school textbook readers. The book is even #72 on the American Library Association list of top 100 banned or challenged books of 2000-2007. So when the book was chosen for the National Endowment of the Arts The Big Read, I had to move it to the top of the list of books to read. The Big Read, I suppose, is a federally supported Oprah's Book Club, except that free copies of the book are provided to libraries, schools, and other voluntary participating institutions. I received my free copy care of the Vermont Arts Council. What better way to begin than with a federally supported/banned book.
I haven't yet decided whether to include plot summaries or spoilers in these posts or not. I hope not to discourage others to read these books for themselves, so for now a brief introduction to the plot and themes will suffice. Fahrenheit 451 follows Guy Montag, a fireman in the speculative future where the populace live hedonistic lives and books are contraband. With fireproof homes, the firemen are employed to burn the remaining caches of books hidden by individuals in defiance of the blanket ban. Reading itself, it seems, is not banned; newspapers and other text are still commonplace, and Guy's wife Mildred participates in her TV programs with a provided script. Instead, the ban on books is a suppression of dissent and free-thinking. Reading the book 56 years after its original publication, I am struck by the similarities between our current society and Bradbury's dystopia. In the book, living rooms are dominated by multiple wall-size television screens with programs designed to include viewer participation. How similar to our current home entertainment centers and reality television or YouTube. In the story, people are rarely without their "seashell" ear radios - comparable to our Ipods, earbuds, or ever present media capabilities on our cell phones. A future where few people are pedestrians, true to our current suburban society, must have been an uncomfortable prediction in the early 50's.
Censorship of a book about censorship is a funny thing. Aside from challenges for language, banning a book for its lesson about the dangers of narrow-minded thinking is insidious and depressing. The book encourages free-thinking and the development of one's own opinions, even to question the value of the opinion itself. A challenge against the book is a statement of distrust in others to form their own opinions. While the book's antiestablishment message to couched in terms specific to the speculative future the characters inhabit, it does encourage the reader to engage in critical thinking beyond one's comfort zone, to participate in a phenomenological study of subjective themes and feelings. And any questioning of the status quo would, invariably, come under attack.
Bradbury himself has a more hardline approach to challenges to his or anyone else's work, regarding any editing, self-censorship, or cultural pressure on the production of an aesthetic work, even critique on behalf of minority or under-represented populations, unacceptable.
Up next: The Story of Little Black Sambo
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