It is perhaps the most provocative foreign policy issue of our time- the hunt for Osama Bin Laden, the man responsible for the largest foreign attack on U.S. soil since Pearl Harbor. Like Pearl Harbor, which resulted in the United States officially entering World War II, the events of...
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, also referred to as The Protocols of the Meetings of the Learned Elders of Zion, is an anti-Semitic hoax first published in Russia in 1903 claiming to document the minutes of a late 19th-century meeting of Jewish leaders discussing their goal of...
The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck, was first published in 1939 and would achieve both the National Book Award and Pulitzer Prize that same year. When Steinbeck was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1962 the novel was referenced frequently. TIME magazine lists it as one of...
The literary world lost another icon this week when Gore Vidal, author, playwright, politician, and commentator, died at the age of 86 last Tuesday from complications due to pneumonia. His over-the-top wit and unconventional wisdom shined in his literature and public opinions. He had a sullen regard for lost...
Harper Lee’s immortal classic, To Kill a Mockingbird, was first published in 1960 to instant acclaim- despite her editors’ warnings that it probably wouldn’t sell all that well. In its first year of release it would garner rave reviews by The New Yorker and Time magazines, as well as...
Supreme Court Justice William Brennan, in summary judgment for Texas vs. Johnson, said, “If there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that the government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea itself offensive or disagreeable.” Anyone is free...
Literature dealing with hot-button topics such as AIDS and child abuse are okay for classroom use- so long as those works have happy endings, at least according to the administrative board of the Fremont Unified School District in California. The board has approved other books with sensitive topics in...
Over these many months this column has shed light on some very real current events around the world in which the freedom to read has been challenged by individuals, or groups, armed with torches lit by the flames of ignorance. This week offers updates on some of those stories....
The banning of books has become the new “Oprah Effect.” As governments and other organizations try to crack down on the spread of material they find offensive, the popularity of those works rises when they are labeled “deviant.” Today, books continue to be challenged or banned in the United...
There’s more reasons to miss Borders in the United States- their willingness to stand up for their employees and their dedication to the freedom to read. The manager of a Borders bookstore in Malaysia has been charged with distributing a book by controversial writer Irshad Manji. A statement by...