The Secret Bookshelf

 

By Marilyn Moore

A story on NPR this morning (February 21, 2024) about a secret bookshelf in a teacher’s classroom in Houston causes me to think, again, about why books are important and why they are banned.  A very brave high school teacher has created a collection in her classroom of more than 600 books on the list that have been banned in Texas, banned because one (that’s right, one) state legislator sent out a list of 800+ books and said they should be removed from classrooms and libraries.  What power, what arrogance, and what a travesty.  

Many of the books are stories of characters who are diverse, especially those who are persons of color and those who are LGBTQ.  No surprise here, those populations are frequently the target of book banners across the country.  Which of course leaves students who are of color and/or who are gay or lesbian or trans with absolutely no way to see themselves in the books in their classroom or library.  Except in this classroom, where the teacher took the list, enlisted help from friends and students, and acquired the books.  

The students who were interviewed described the books as overflowing the bookshelf, spilling into plastic totes (kind of like the bookshelf in my study, except the books aren’t secret).  They talked about the importance of seeing themselves in print; one said that such books gave her hope.  Teenagers need hope; we all need hope.  And seeing how others who are like us have survived, prevailed, and emerged strong is a source of hope.  

It is astonishing and discouraging to me that this is still an issue; we’ve dealt with book bans throughout the world’s history, and as the popular Facebook meme says, “book banners have never been the good guys in history.”   But they’re still at it.  

Among the books that have been banned the most are classics.  To Kill a Mockingbird.  Catcher in the Rye.  The Diary of Anne Frank.  Is there a reader anywhere who hasn’t paused to think about justice after reading To Kill a Mockingbird?  Or a teenage boy anywhere who hasn’t found himself somewhere in the pages of Catcher in the Rye?  Or a student learning about WWII who hasn’t felt it all up close and personal after reading the story of Anne Frank?  Or who hasn’t pondered the future of the world after reading 1984 or Brave New World?  I get it, to some readers these books may have been dull, or uninteresting.  But is that a reason to ban them?

No, these books aren’t banned because they’re dull or uninteresting.  They’ve banned because they made somebody uncomfortable, or they caused someone to think they would make a student uncomfortable.  They make me uncomfortable, too.  Shouldn’t a miscarriage of justice make us uncomfortable?  Shouldn’t we vow “Never again,” when we read Anne Frank’s story?  Shouldn’t we be nervous about how easily truth can become lies and lies can become truth?  Of course we should, that’s what education is…to confront knowledge we didn’t know, and expand our understanding of the world in the process.

I’ve been thinking about what books would be on my secret bookcase…books that have contributed to my understanding of who I am and how I fit, or don’t, in this world.  As a white cisgendered female I’ve not had to look as hard for characters that look like me as the students in the Houston classroom, especially the Black lesbian girls.  I do remember realizing as a new teacher that there were few stories that celebrated girls for their courage.  I cheered when I found Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco, a story about a little girl who is very afraid, and is shown by her grandmother how to be brave.   And Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wrinkle in Time, whose main character is Meg, age 12, gawky and awkward and not fitting in, summoning up the courage to find her father in a place that is literally worlds away.  

A Wrinkle in Time introduced me to Madeleine L’Engle, who has touched the part of my soul and my world where space and time and music and connections and possibilities all come together, with the most glorious of metaphors and the most real of human beings and their lives.  I suspect this Newberry Award winner has been challenged someplace, most likely because the spirituality that pervades it does not match easily with any traditional understanding.  I will always remember the student in my classroom, a sixth grader, who said with a sigh and a look of wonder when we read the last paragraph, “That is such a good story.”  And it is.  And when I visited The Cathedral of Saint John the Divine in New York, where she was resident writer for years, I sensed all over again those themes of joy and music and wonder and awe.

Other books that would be on my secret bookshelf, except I don’t have to keep them secret.  One is Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer, who brings to the pages the insights of an indigenous woman, a botanist, a climate activist, a teacher, a writer with a profound insight into the sacred worth of creation.  It reminded me of Keith County Journal by John Janovy, Jr., where I met the king snail, stagnicola elodes, who taught me to ask the question, "What am I willing to gamble to find my place, and my time?"

The One Hundred Years of Lenni and Margot by Marianne Cronin, painting pictures in the art therapy room in the hospital in Glasgow where both are patients, illustrating their combined ages, one painting for each of Lenni’s seventeen years and Margot’s 83 years.  What would I paint that would remind me of when I was four, or fourteen, or sixty-four?  And Dakota, by Kathleen Norris, who writes about the impact of the wide-open plains on the growth of her own spirituality.  Anything by Maya Angelou, especially her poetry.  And Anne Lamott, who shines the bright light of humor, brutal honesty, and profound insight on every stage of life.

I could identify many more, and I suspect you are thinking of the books you would name that have affected your life.  Books that we didn’t have to read in secret, books that we found in some way, books that made us uncomfortable, or hopeful, or joyous, or sad…books that open doors to worlds we don’t know, and books that shed light on the life we do know.  That’s what the teacher in Houston is providing for her students…and it shouldn’t have to be in secret.  

Like and follow us on Facebook @5 Women Mayhem.