Somebody is always trying to remove a book from a shelf, and the reasons are always excellent. This tag collects posts on censorship and book banning, the mechanics of it, and what it does to writers and readers.
1960sHarper Lee was born on April 28, 1926, in Monroeville, Alabama. A year's wages from friends and two years of revision with her editor turned a draft of loose anecdotes into To Kill a Mockingbird. She never published another novel…
1930sJohn Steinbeck was born on February 27, 1902, in Salinas, California. He reported on migrant camps before he wrote The Grapes of Wrath, refused to soften its ending, and watched a California county ban it. The habit worth copying is…
AprilMaya Angelou was born on April 4, 1928, in St. Louis. An editor told her autobiography as literature was close to impossible, and she answered with I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. She wrote it, and six more volumes,…
CensorshipRoald Dahl was born on September 13, 1916, crashed a fighter plane in the desert, sold his first story for $1,000, and wrote the children's books in a garden hut with six sharpened pencils. In 2023 his publisher's edits to…
1960sLolita (1962) rates 7 out of 10 on the rewatch scale. Kubrick adapted a novel about a predator by removing everything the Production Code forbade, which was most of the subject. He later said that had he understood the censorship…
Book WritingBanned Books Week is late September. A personal story about being denied The Grapes of Wrath in high school, and why the fight over reading still matters.
CensorshipBooks carry ideas, and that is exactly why people keep trying to burn them. From Socrates to Harry Potter, the impulse to ban runs straight through history. Here is where book banning came from, the motivations that keep it alive,…
CensorshipA writer's reflection on Independence Day, from childhood fireworks to Big Bear Lake, from grandfather's POW camp to the freedom to build a career out of words
CensorshipPolitical correctness is a moving target, and for anyone writing a book it shapes what you can say and how you say it. Here are seven honest insights into where it helps, where it constrains, and how writers and ghostwriters…
CensorshipOn trigger warnings, both camps are half right and neither is listening, protection on one side, censorship on the other. The real question is quieter: should a book tell you what is inside before you open it? Having ghostwritten memoirs…
CensorshipTikTok has captivated nearly 1.9 billion users, and critics argue it is built on shallowness, addiction, and surveillance. Here is a critical look, backed by the numbers and the research, at why TikTok earns the criticism.
AI Writing PitfallsYouTube is the biggest video platform on the planet, and the more I use it, the more I mutter YouTube sucks. Copyright abuse, an algorithm designed to drive people crazy, and an AI slop invasion. Here is my honest love-hate…
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