What is this? From the available records, India is the country that historically accounts for most of the book bans in the World, as 11.11% of all recorded bans occurred in India at some point. China is responsible for 8.99% of all book bans, and Singapore accounts for 8.47%.
What Is the Most Banned Book in America? For all time, the most frequently banned book is 1984 by George Orwell. (How very Orwellian!) The most banned and challenged book for 2020 was George by Alex Gino.
Book banning and censorship have been common practices in countries like China and Hong Kong in order to protect the Chinese Communist Party from criticism. Politically sensitive reading materials as well as those dealing with religion, sexual content, and other taboo topics are consistently avoided by booksellers.
There were concerns over the violence and increasingly dark tone of the later books but most of the censorship attempts were for religious reasons. It was also banned in some Christian schools in the UK.
Charlotte's Web by E.B. White
Due to themes of death and the fact that the main characters are talking animals, a parent group in Kansas sought to ban the book from their students' school libraries.
“The Color Purple” by Alice Walker has been banned in schools all over the country since 1984, due to its graphic sexual content and situations of violence and abuse. While “The Color Purple” contains a lot of controversial content, it's necessary to the story and is what makes the book so real and unique.
Literary researchers agree that during the 20th century Australia was considered one of the harshest censors in the Western world. Books seen to arouse curiosity about sexual pleasure were deemed obscene under Australian censorship legislation and removed by Australian Customs.
They stated this explains why the book versions of Animal Farm and Nineteen Eighty-Four are available in Mainland China, but added that all references to Mao Zedong have been removed from Nineteen Eighty-Four.
The Great Gatsby was challenged and banned for a few reasons: sex, violence, adultery, and language. The affair between Daisy and Gatsby along with Nick's language regarding Jordan Baker make up most of the sex and adultery reasoning behind the challenging and banning of the book.
Banned books often deal with subjects that are realistic, timely, and topical. Young people may find a character going through exactly what they are, which makes it a powerful reading experience and helps the reader sort out thorny issues like grief, divorce, sexual assault, bullying, prejudice, and sexual identity.
Legal protections
Australia does not have explicit freedom of speech in any constitutional or statutory declaration of rights, with the exception of political speech which is protected from criminal prosecution at common law per Australian Capital Television Pty Ltd v Commonwealth.
The Commonwealth Customs Department, which had the authority to prohibit imports under the Customs Act 1901, kept a reference library of around 15,000 books, magazines and comics banned in Australia between the 1920s and the 1970s. Some of the titles are rare editions, and many are no longer in print.
One of California's largest industries at the time was logging. Parents were concerned that teachers were “brainwashing” their children and were fearful the children would start an uprising against the logging industry. Because of this, “The Lorax” was banned in a Laytonville, California public school.
Tropic of Cancer, by Henry Miller
Henry Miller's Tropic of Cancer, published in 1934 in France, was controversial due to its rampant misogyny, sexually graphic content, and themes of toxic masculinity. Its 1961 publication in America led to a series of dozens of famous obscenity trials across the country.
The authorities further believe that the books promote negative foreign behavior, especially on issues such as transgender, gay, lesbianism, bisexuality, intersex, and asexuality. Book stores in Tanzania have been ordered to take the books off their shelves and display racks.
The book was misunderstood and was seen as being critical of all forms of socialism, rather than specifically Stalinist communism. The American Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) funded a cartoon version in 1955. Because of its illegality, many in Soviet-controlled territory first read it in pirated, 'samizdat' form.
Foreign books in translation – including A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens and Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë – were among the books banned for their socially corrupting material.
In 1931, the work was banned in China by the Governor of Huan Province on the grounds that “Animals should not use human language, and…it [is] disastrous to put animals and human beings on the same level.”
In a nutshell, it seems publishers' production costs in Australia are higher than in, say, the USA, and local copyright laws prohibit Australian booksellers from 'parallel importing' — importing the same books at cheaper prices.
Fahrenheit 451: banned in Australia on the basis of “questionable themes” such as censorship, repression and religion. Lord of the Flies: for its use of profanity, extreme violence, and statements defamatory to women.
The American Library Association states that The Catcher in the Rye has been banned by schools and public libraries for having “excess vulgar language, sexual scenes, things concerning moral issues, excessive violence and anything dealing with the occult” and “communism,” among other things.
Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck is regularly on the banned books list put out by the American Library Association. It has been banned because of vulgarity, racism, and its treatment of women.
All Boys Aren't Blue has frequently been censored because it includes LGBTQIA+ content and profanity; it is also "considered to be sexually explicit." In 2021, the American Library Association's Office of Intellectual Freedom named it the third most banned and challenged book in the United States of the year, and it ...
Though the children use their imaginations to create their own little world, as many young children may do, parents unjustly attach the use of imagination to the idea of witchcraft. Another reason parents attempt to ban this novel is the claim that “Bridge to Terabithia” promotes atheism.