It’s Banned Book Week: read at own risk

It runs this week, until September 27.

A number of high-profile releases were banned in apartheid South Africa, including titles by the late Nadine Gordimer (July’s People – now part of the school curriculum; A World Of Strangers; Burger’s Daughter), Andre Brink (Knowledge At Night), Lewis Nkosi (Mating Birds) and William Modisane (Blame Me On History).

Given the context, those actions might have been deemed understandable.

Less obvious are the reasons behind the banning of classics such as Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, which joined the above protest works in the bin on the grounds – according to the SA government – that it contained “obscene and indecent material”.

Australian authorities have made some strange choices over the years as well in terms of the titles they’ve chosen to ban, but a couple of books on their list merit attention, for very different reasons.

HC Asterley’s 1931 novel Rowena Goes To Far was blocked, with this rather splendid explanation: “It lacks sufficient claim to the literary to excuse the obscenity.”

Everyone’s a critic.

A more prosaic example involved a series of books including volumes such as How To Make Disposable Silencers not making it to the shelves of Australian stores – for more obvious reasons.

See below a video dealing with the banning of books made by American author Dav Pilkey, whose Captain Underpants children’s novel series has sold over 70 000 copies worldwide, despite being one of the most regularly banned books in US libraries.