Across the United States, efforts to ban books have skyrocketed. In 2022, this push reached an unprecedented level, with the number of challenged books nearly doubling since 2021.
"The last two years have been exhausting, frightening, outrage inducing," Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of The American Library Association (ALA)'s Office for Intellectual Freedom, told PBS.
These books vary in content and narration, but share the fact that they are in peril. Many of the books targeted feature Black or LGBTQ characters. Examples include Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe, a memoir about adolescence and gender identity, banned and challenged in schools in Florida, Rhode Island, New Jersey, Ohio, Washington, and Texas.
Then there's The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, a young adult novel inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement that examines systemic racism, police violence, class, and trauma, banned several times since 2017 in various states and schools.
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The 1619 Project (and the children's version titled Born on the Water) by Nikole Hannah-Jones, has also been frequently questioned — in 2021, the book was challenged in 27 states. Hannah-Jones has criticised the wave of state laws and proposed book bans in schools for texts that acknowledge America's legacy of systemic racism and examine the academic framework of critical race theory.
Challenging books has become a priority for some government officials, such as Texas state lawmaker Matt Krause, who requested in 2021 that public school libraries disclose whether they held any of a lengthy list of 850 books about topics including race and sexuality. Florida governor and presidential hopeful Ron DeSantis continues to implement measures against certain books, furthering censorship and scrutiny of books about race, gender, and LGBTQ issues. Groups like Moms for Liberty, a conservative group claiming to campaign for "parental rights," have also tried to censor books in public schools that feature topics like sexual and racial identity (but also seahorses).
Other titles that have faced challenges in libraries across the country include The Black Flamingo by Dean Atta, Tomboy by Liz Prince, The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison, Juliet Takes a Breath by Gabby Rivera, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous by Ocean Vuong, and Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison. In September 2022, the Girls Who Code book series was temporarily banned in a Pennsylvania school district, in a move that made headlines and angered many.
This attack on literature has sprouted counter-movements and resistance. In May 2023, for instance, PEN America and Penguin Random House filed a lawsuit against a Florida school for "unconstitutional" removal of books from libraries. PEN America is also running a campaign with poet Amanda Gorman, whose inauguration poem "The Hill We Climb" was removed from an elementary school in Miami Lakes, Florida.
Other campaigns are coming from libraries themselves. In mid-2022, the Brooklyn Public Library launched Books UnBanned, a teen-led initiative catering to young readers across the country, regardless of state. The program allows young people across America to register for a free digital library card and access a whole bunch of banned and challenged books. The hope is to provide access to those who find themselves especially marginalized and who do not often see themselves reflected in the pages of most writing.
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"Access to information is the great promise upon which public libraries were founded,” said Linda E. Johnson, BPL's president and CEO, in a press statement.
"We cannot sit idly by while books rejected by a few are removed from the library shelves for all. Books UnBanned will act as an antidote to censorship, offering teens and young adults across the country unlimited access to our extensive collection of ebooks and audiobooks, including those which may be banned in their home libraries."
"We cannot sit idly by while books rejected by a few are removed from the library shelves for all."
The initiative, and its ambitions, join a rank of resources hoping to fight against the crackdown on books and intellectual ventures. Below are some of the places you can access materials that have been challenged elsewhere.
Where to access banned books
Books UnBanned
The Brooklyn Public Library has a number of support systems in place for teens struggling with the prospect of banned books in their hometowns and daily lives.
First, people aged 13-21 can apply for a free digital library card that's valid for one year, and which opens the doors to the BPL's full eBook collection and learning databases — that's 350,00 e-books, 200,000 audiobooks, and more than 100 databases. You can do so by emailing [email protected] or via the library's Instagram account, @bklynfuture.
The eCard is always free to teenagers in the state, who can apply through the library's website. The fee for the card for those who live outside New York is normally $50 but currently, the library is waiving this.
Wider resources are available on the site, including information to help readers report book challenges at local libraries or to request book recommendations from fellow teens.
BPL has also compiled a list of banned and/or challenged books, which continues to be updated. The list includes an array of libraries where the books can be found. The formats include actual physical copies but also eBooks and eAudiobooks. You can check all possible locations by clicking on the dropdown menu underneath each book title.
Com Library
The College of the Mainland, a public community college in Texas City, Texas, has a dedicated page for banned books, which explores the history of literature that has been challenged and why certain texts are more in peril than others.
To access these titles you have to be a member of the institution, but the library includes a list of frequently banned books that can be read for free on Google Books and other sites. Titles include The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne and Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck. There are explanations beneath each book, detailing why they have been banned historically.
Upenn: Read Banned Books
The University of Pennsylvania has compiled a list of banned books, some of which are available to read for free online. This includes The 1619 Project, James Joyce's Ulysses, and John Milton's Areopagitica.
Many Books
On Many Books, a catalogue of thousands of free eBooks, you can access a variety of banned books, including political cornerstones like Candide by Voltaire and The Rights of Man by Thomas Paine. Simply click on the title you're interested in, and you'll be asked to sign in, either using your Google account or creating a new account on the site itself. Afterwards, click "Free Download" where you can choose the format you are seeking: a PDF, an eBook (which can also go directly onto your Apple Books library), and more.
You can also click "Read Online" to read entire texts on the site itself.
Other free eLibraries
A cluster of public, free-for-all online libraries offer access to titles that have been challenged. Libby, for instance, allows readers to borrow ebooks, audiobooks, magazines, and more from your local library — in some instances you may have to visit the library in person to pick up your library card, depending on where you live. The app can be downloaded on the App Store or Google Play. The company has previously outlined and discussed the importance of reading banned books.
Similarly, Hoopla allows access to your local library for free, providing access to a range of materials which can be downloaded or streamed from your smartphone or desktop. You can sign up online, by using any email address. After borrowing, titles are automatically returned at the end of the designated lending period — the same goes for Libby.
With vital texts being placed in jeopardy, these resources can hopefully restore accessibility, fight censorship, and open the doors to allowing teens, in particular, to read texts that matter.
Topics Books Social Good
