Hey Book Dealers, you’ll have one more list to check
- by Bruce E. McKinney
The State of Pennsylvania is second and probably will eventually be No. 1 in what are book bannings at the school district level unless Iowa, Florida and Idaho’s irate parents beat them to it. It turns out the religious right is insisting on telling you what your children can read. It’s called censorship.
The Central Bucks School District in Pennsylvania recently passed a new book-removal policy by a 6-3 vote Tuesday evening. This policy allows just one adult – be it parent, guardian, or community member, whoever – to challenge a book simply “on the basis of appropriateness” and have it eventually entirely removed from district libraries. What could go wrong with that?
Given that standing is broadly offered, and because most library holdings are publicly accessible, who is to say this new openness to censorship won’t lead to challenges to the Bible whose blood-soaked prose may offend some.
Or, for the politically minded, the constitution in its earliest iteration that counted slaves as six tenths of a white man.
Or , for the openly racist, can they object to all books mentioning Blacks and the sons of the Dominican Republic, who dominate major league baseball today.
For reference for the literate, the Roman Catholic Church organized a list of banned books, the Index Librorum Prohibitorum in 1559. Science, philosophy and fiction were targeted and in time included:
Les Miserables by Victor Hugo
The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexander Dumas
On the Revolutions of the Heavenly Spheres by Nicolaus Copernicus
The Hunchback of Notre Dame by Victor Hugo
Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
The Index Librorum Prohibitorum was abolished in 1966.
People have long objected to some content but the idea that a single individual’s objection can clear a school’s shelves sounds eerily close to the appointment of a or the Fuhrer.
In the dark these two words sound similar: democracy or dumbocracy.
Irrespective of your political views, be voting during the primaries and general elections. If you don’t defend your rights, expect to lose them.
Fonsie Mealy’s Rare Books & Collectors’ Sale April 30th & May 1st
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Taylor (Geo.) & Skinner (A.) Maps of the Roads of Ireland, Surveyed 1777. Lond. & Dublin 1778. €500 to €750.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Messingham (Thos.) Florilegium Insulae Sanctorum seu Vitae et Acta Sanctorum Hibernia, Paris 1624. €350 to €500.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Heaney (Seamus). The Haw Lantern, L. (Faber & Faber) 1987, First Edn., Signed and dated. €225 to €350.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Valencey (Lt. Col. Chas.) Collectanea de Rebus Hibernicis, Vols. I-IV, 4 vols. Dublin 1786. €400 to €600.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Powerscourt (Viscount). A Description and History of Powerscourt, Lond. 1903. €350 to €500.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Moryson (Fynes). An Itinerary ... Containing His Ten Yeeres Travel Through the Twelve Dominions of Germany, Bohermerland, Sweitzerland…, Lond. (John Beale) 1617. €700 to €1,000.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: After Buffon, Birds of Europe, c. 1820. Approx. 120 fine hd. cold. plts., mor. backed boards. €125 to €250.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Dunlevy (Andrew). An Teagasg Criosduidhe De Reir Ceasda agus Freagartha... The Catechism or Christian Doctrine by Way of Question and Answer, Paris (James Guerin) 1742. €400 to €700.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1:The Georgian Society Records of Eighteen-Century Domestic Architecture in Dublin, 5 vols. Complete, Dublin 1909-1913. €500 to €750.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Scale (Bernard). An Hibernian Atlas or General Description of the Kingdom of Ireland, L. (Robert Sayer & John Bennet) 1776. €625 to €850.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: [Johnson (Rev. Samuel)]. Julian the Apostate Being a Short Account of his Life, together with a Comparison of Popery and Paganism,L. (Langley Curtis) 1682. €300 to €400.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Nichlson (Wm.) Illustrator. An Almanac of Twelve Sports, Lond. 1898. €300 to €400.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Heaney (Seamus) trans. The Light of the Leaves, 2 vols., Mexico (Imprenta de los Tropicos/Bunholt) 1999. €1,500 to €2,000.
Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: Fleming (Ian). Moonraker, L. (Jonathan Cape) 1955. €1,500 to €2,000.
![Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1: [Johnson (Rev. Samuel)]. Julian the Apostate Being a Short Account of his Life, together with a Comparison of Popery and Paganism,L. (Langley Curtis) 1682. €300 to €400.](https://ae-files.s3.amazonaws.com/AdvertisementPhotos/e08f39b2-647e-4890-9a6d-b744e07a6c91.jpg "<b>Fonsie Mealy’s, Apr 30-May 1:</b> [Johnson (Rev. Samuel)]. <i>Julian the Apostate Being a Short Account of his Life, together with a Comparison of Popery and Paganism,</i>L. (Langley Curtis) 1682. €300 to €400.")
