Book Censorship in Public Schools: Bradbury’s Warning - 70 Years Later

Written by Krishna (Aniketh) Vallabhajosyula

Edited by Anahitha Raffe Sofia

In 1953, Ray Bradbury published one of the most influential novels of the 20th century: Fahrenheit 451. The novel takes place in a dystopian world where books are banned and burned deliberately to restrict knowledge. Ironically, this book was banned in numerous countries and U.S. public schools for its perceived vulgar content: profanity and violence. In Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury expressed his contempt for the restriction of knowledge and free-flowing ideas in the United States. Written during the Second Red Scare, a period of persecution & repression of left-leaning “communist” individuals, Bradbury showed that in the presence of knowledge restriction, humanity falls. The novel details the sedentary, indoctrinated lives of the people in a world without free thought, where they are forced to believe whatever the government wants them to believe.

Nearly seventy years later, the warning set forth by Bradbury can be seen in a supposedly education-rich area: public schools. In the 2022-2023 school year, PEN America recorded 3,362 occurrences of book bans in American Public School classrooms or libraries. This marked an increase of nearly 33% compared to the 2021-2022 school year. Book bans are on the rise; and aren’t showing any signs of stopping. Some common themes discussed in these banned or censored books are, astonishingly, ones about race, sexual orientation, abuse, health, and pain or death. These topics are important to confront and deal with, especially for children.

The biggest rationale for banning these books is subjective “inappropriate” conduct. For instance, one of the most powerful graphic novels I have ever read, Maus, was recently banned in the McMinn School County in Tennessee. I read the novel last year, and it follows the journey of Vladek Spiegelman, a Holocaust survivor, throughout his lifetime. The novel details the atrocities committed by the Nazis in WWII and was banned for its use of mild nudity and curse words. However, it must be said that this usage serves only to enhance the story being told, to truly let the reader experience the horrors of life under Nazi rule. The nudity depicted comes as Vladek and other Jewish people are being escorted into Auschwitz, a major concentration camp, and stripped of their belongings. This nudity serves to depict the dehumanizing practices employed by the Nazis. As for the language, profanity is used to depict the severity and accuracy of what happened in real life.

For lack of a better statement, the decision to ban Maus was inherently and utterly stupid. Because of this one decision, the novel was removed from the eighth-grade curriculum in the county’s schools. When I was in the 8th grade, I also read this book and completed assignments on it. By reading this novel, I felt like I could fully understand the actual emotions of people who went through a horrendous time.

No matter how uncomfortable these books may be, they provide an account that history class cannot. A novel about racism, prejudice, and sexism reveals the emotions of the people actually facing these problems. People who have never experienced emotions like these simply do not and cannot explain what it feels like to a student. However, the books that are being banned, like Maus by Art Spiegelman and The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, actually provide an account that no one else can. No one can convey the atrocities of discrimination better than a persecuted minority. By banning these books, school districts are not only hindering the flow of knowledge but are ignorantly oppressing difficult truths just for the sake of “protection.”

As Art Spiegelman summarized himself, “This is disturbing imagery, but you know what? It’s disturbing history.” Any book ban may take grounds on “age-inappropriate” or “anti-[insert group name here],” but in the grand scheme of things, the topics being covered are difficult to deal with and fully understand. These topics have to be addressed, no matter how uncomfortable they may be. By banning these books, schools are just kicking the can down the road for these young people to confront later. It is much easier for children to confront the imperfections of the world when they are young than when they grow up. These school districts are hiding the truth from their students, falsely indoctrinating them with the notion that the world is perfect. IT IS NOT. In no time or place is the restriction of knowledge a form of protection. These bans hide knowledge and obscure problems that people have to face at one point in their lives. It’s not just in schools, or exclusive to the U.S. either. Book bans occur on national levels too. In 2015, Maus was banned in Russia for having the swastika on its front cover. This is absurd! A novel about the holocaust is obviously going to include Nazi imagery, as it serves to preserve accuracy and severity.

As Bradbury predicted, book bans can be the beginning of the end. By allowing these things to happen without confrontation, we are letting our society become hindered. Our growth, not to mention the emotional growth of students, will be destroyed. In Fahrenheit 451, the restriction of knowledge was allowed because unwelcome information caused pain or anxiety. Regardless of how unwelcome or painful a subject is, it must be discussed, especially starting from a young age.

So, what can you do about this problem? By doing what I’m doing right now. Speak out against book bans. Create your own blog, sign petitions, protest in the streets even. Try to find a group of people who you can work with. Find or create an effort to fight against censorship. Any idea can be a great idea. These examples of censorship in the U.S. are only occurring because people aren’t speaking out against it. If a group of parents chooses a novel as a scapegoat for all of their child’s emotional suffering, then the novel isn’t the problem. It’s the people that are allowing for the restriction of knowledge. I leave you with this message: oppression cannot exist when people fight against it.

Works Cited

Gross, Jenny. “'Maus' Holocaust Novel Removed From Classrooms by School Board.” The New York Times, 27 January 2022, https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/27/us/maus-banned-holocaust-tennessee.html. Accessed 26 March 2024.

PEN America. “School Book Bans: The Mounting Pressure to Censor.” PEN America, 2023, https://pen.org/report/book-bans-pressure-to-censor/. Accessed 26 March 2024.

Spiegelman, Art. Maus: A Survivor's Tale. Penguin, 1987.

Thomas, Angie. The Hate U Give. HarperCollins, 2017.