This week (February 20-26th) is Freedom to Read week in Canada – a week where we can reflect upon and celebrate our independence to read whatever we want. (Think Banned Books Week that the ALA hosts every year in the USA.)
For those fellow Canadians, I hope that you will take some time this week to browse the Freedom to Read website. Some areas that might be of interest are the list of books and magazines that have been challenged in Canada (and why), posters that have been used to promote awareness of Freedom to Read week in the past, and a history of book bannings and burnings over the centuries.
Side note: what I found most interesting about the list of challenged books was how so many of the books on there were different than the one on the ALA list. I suppose that is partially due to the fact that a lot of them are in the french language. But then at the same time, there was also the fact that a lot of the expected ones – To Kill a Mockingbird, Huckleberry Finn, etc – are still there. And so many of the books are so good too! (There are a few of them that I cannot stand – Duddy Kravitz for example, blegh – but I wouldn’t want them banned from allowing others to read them. Totally not cool.)
Anyway, what I want to say is, go ye forth and celebrate reading whatever the heck you want, whenever the heck you want to read it, without anyone telling you what you can and cannot read! Word.