This week, I have provided with you a classic Brook Reading episode, full of 5 minute rants, an author biography, and a review of a text that is as integral to our society as Shakespeare and as censored as Salinger. Art Spiegelman’s graphic novel, Maus, is the historically accurate tale of the author’s parents’ horrific capture and imprisonment at Auschwitz during World War II. The novel has recently been banned by a school district in Tennessee, and due to this, is nearly impossible to find in libraries and booksellers.

As I have previously discussed in episodes dealing with banned and censored works, the message of the text is always more important and necessary to our society than the reasons behind the censorship. This novel outlining the horrors inflicted upon the Jewish population should not be forgotten by, or banned from, our students.

Continue the conversation. Find yourself a copy of “Maus”. Share with others. Stop the Censorship.

“When books are run out of school classrooms and libraries, I’m never much disturbed. Not as a citizen, not as a writer, not even as a schoolteacher…which I used to be. What I tell kids is, don’t get mad, get even. Don’t spend time waving signs or carrying petitions around the neighborhood. Instead, RUN, don’t walk, to the nearest non-school library or the local bookstore and get whatever it was that they banned. Read whatever they’re trying to keep out of your eyes and your brain, because that’s exactly what you need to know.” - Stephen King

Promo: Book Sweet Shop in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and online at https://www.shopbooksweet.com/ Go visit them on Instagram @shopbooksweet

Visit https://www.brookreadingpodcast.com for all the links mentioned in the episode.

Intro music: Sean Faust
Outro music: Victoria Timpanaro