Trading Card for Banned Books Week

Apparently, a library in Kansas has banned books trading cards for this year’s edition of Banned Books Week. I must say that this is a brilliant idea, and when I read that you could get a Slaughterhouse Five trading card, I was instantly transported back to the days of my youth, especially my days of being a middle school student. I attended a very public middle school in a very rural area of South Carolina, and the administrators would hold a student assembly at the start of each school year, telling students WHAT items were banned from the school for the year. For most of us, we nodded our heads in agreement. However, for the more rebellious teens, they smirked and knew they would have to resort to “external sources.” Although certainly not a rebel myself, there was one year I decided to “break the rules” for the first time.

Justin was his name, and he was this “external source.” Justin was the school “bootlegger,” a tall, lanky kid who had shaggy hair and always wore massive work boots. However, the irony of it was that Justin did not bootleg cigarettes or alcohol but instead bootleg things that were totally legal in “normal” society but had been banned from the rest of the school. Among these bootlegged items were Pokemon trading cards, CDs with Parental Advisories, paper footballs (yes – paper footballs were banned, and for many students the paper footballs were too risky to make at school. Justin had the bright idea of making them at home and then selling them to students) and lastly, Justin had books – all kinds of books – books that I would never ask my parents to buy and certainly could not be found in the school library.

One of those “bootlegged” books, believe it or not, was The Naked Lunch by William S. Borroughs. Other bootlegged copies Justin carried included Lolita, Vonnegut books, and many Stephen King novels. There were several more, but considering it has been over 10 years since I’ve revisited this memory, the details are a little bit foggy. The Naked Lunch appealed to me the most, though, mainly because I had gotten a sneak peak of the movie from my cousin, and he told me I needed to be older before I could catch a peek. In other words, I wanted the forbidden fruit, and I guess having the word naked in the title made it that much more unruly, so that’s the title I ultimately chose.

I must say that it was strange meeting Justin, the bootlegger, in the corner of the library to exchange the “goods.” I gave him some lunch money, and he subsequently handed over the book.

“Seven day loan,” he said to me, looking me square in the eye.

“Okay.”

And that was that.

Ray Bradbury, the great writer of Fahrenheit 451

Like this memory, the whole mystery, the idea of a book being banned or banished or censored, becomes a part of the book’s aura or “experience.” As Hans-Robert Jauss theorized, the experience of a book is just as much about the reader, as the book itself. In other words, the reader and the expectations that they bring to a particular book (these expectations being influenced by their background, gender, socioeconomic status, etc.) creates the book. On the same note, the laws and rules that govern a particular geographical area also create a book. This is not only because the banishment yields hype but also for a teenager like myself, peeking into a banned book is a moment of supposed teenage rebellion, a moment that does not “cross the line” such as drugs or alcohol but merely gives me a glimpse into that dangerous world.

As I reflect on those days of youth and revisit the banned books I read when I was younger, the whole experience of reading a “banned” book as an adult, books like The Catcher in the Rye, reminds me of a scene in Ray Bradbury’s notorious novel, Fahrenheit 451. As Banned Books Week comes to a close, we must honor Bradbury (who died this past June) for capturing what it is truly like to inhabit the world of a place that attempts to squash books or –in other words—ideas themselves. In Bradbury’s dramatic rendering of a society that fears truth and honesty, we get a glimpse into how ideas can make groups of people be set in turmoil due solely to the expression of others. However, there is one pivotal quote in particular that I memorized from the novel; the words come from Faber, a previous English professor in hiding:

“Do you know why books such as this are so important? Because they have quality. And what does the word quality mean? To me it means texture. This book has pores.”

For book-lovers, this quote is like a fist-shaking anthem. However, nerdiness aside, there is certainly a ring of truth to this quote: books were experienced at a specific time in the reader’s lives, much like a living person. Re-reading a banned book is like running into an old friend in the street – you can’t help and be surprised but when you talk to this old friend, a floodgate opens and you are suddenly transported to a time in your life, when you were younger and a little bit more curious. So, let’s raise our glasses to the writers who challenged the norm, had the courage to stand up, and gave us an experience that will, more than likely, last a lifetime.