"We should all see attacks on books as an 'early warning' signal that attacks on humans cannot be far behind."
- Richard Ovenden from Burning the Books: A History of the Deliberate Destruction of Knowledge
These are the kinds of stories that keep recurring through the years. Yes, over and over, you hear stories of schools and libraries banning certain works from famous authors, because somebody objects to something in the book. It seems to happen to almost every author at one point or another. After all, you will almost always find somebody somewhere in a country as huge as the United States to take offense to something, even in books widely perceived to be powerful and respected. Some of the names often included in these kinds of bans include J.D. Salinger, George Orwell, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Kurt Vonnegut, and even Mark Twain.
Often times, these kinds of bands actually have the opposite of the intended consequences. These school boards will make headlines by placing these bans, and that will generate controversy. Then, the work in question will suddenly see a resurgence in popularity. Also, these school boards often face a torrent of criticism, and allegations of de facto censorship. Sometimes, they even back down, although that likely does not happen all that frequently.
Well, it has happened again. This time, it happened in Tennessee. The McMinn County School Board's unanimous vote to remove Art Spiegelman’s Maus from their curriculum. Most people are aware of the book. Spiegelman is a cartoonist, and Maus is his most famous book. It documents his relationship with his father, who survived the Holocaust, and who was sent to Auschwitz by the Nazis. His father also revealed some prejudices of his own in the book, particularly against black people.
What did the school board object to?
Well actually, there were a few things that they apparently did not like. There are eight curse words in the book, as well as an image of a nude woman, which was depicted to show the suicide of the author’s mother.
The swear words are predictable. As for the nudity, or perhaps the objection to the depiction of suicide that goes with it? Do they really think that typical teenagers will get aroused by the portrayal of a nude woman about to kill herself? If there are kids like that, most likely they have bigger problems than the school board can do much of anything about and, frankly, the book will not likely be what sets the kid off or pushes him over the edge. Or do they think that will be shocking or harmful to their delicate sensibilities, while the actual suicide, let alone the whole story of the Holocaust and Auschwitz in the book will not be? Maybe it's just me, but I simply don't get it.
Again, this book is about things from the author’s life that actually happened, either to him or to people very close to him (particularly his parents). It is a both a historical and biographical account, and the illustrated nature of the book adds another unique element to it. All of that combines to make this book more accessible in many respects than other books might otherwise be. The illustrations make it more immediate and, yes, visible. In some ways, it can be considered more visually powerful than a movie or television depiction, because of the character portrayals, particularly by nationality. Finally, it is very personal, which makes it quite moving. The author goes into detail about his own grappling with what happened, how his parents were impacted, and the father’s own seeming racism that survived his getting out of the Holocaust alive.
In short, it is an important work that can really help people understand the Holocaust a lot better. Given that some headlines these days suggest a rather shocking level of ignorance about this topic among Americans, with some suggestions that two-thirds of Americans do not know that six millions Jews were killed, and other findings showing that a quarter of Americans believe that the reports and statistics regarding the Holocaust are exaggerated.
Why a school board's ban on 'Maus' may put the book in the hands of more readers by Rachel Treisman, January 31, 2022:
https://www.npr.org/2022/01/31/1076970866/maus-banned-tennessee-school-board?utm_medium=social&utm_term=nprnews&utm_source=facebook.com&utm_campaign=npr&fbclid=IwAR0p2LnnDPEojkFE3YMhpPK8um0HqZkNI4YEo9aIsiPbMjFVUkSx9i08_lM
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