"America’s romance with forbidden books has a long history that goes all the way back to Huckleberry Finn."
Art Spiegelman in his New York studio. ALAMY STOCK PHOTO
"America’s romance with forbidden books has a long history that goes all the way back to Huckleberry Finn (1884) and Darwin’s The Origin of the Species, which was banned in 1895 for violating Christian beliefs. These days, there is a cultural war being waged in classrooms and school districts from Florida to Virginia and Pennsylvania, where books are being pulled from curriculums and public libraries because of their anti-racist or LGBTQ+ subject matter – books such as Toni Morrison’s Beloved or Alison Bechdel’s Fun Home. 'They don’t seem to know that banning books never works,' says Art Spielgelman, the creator of Maus, a recently banned book. 'It ignites the interest in reading what is forbidden.'”
Article: Art Spiegelman: ‘Banning books never works. It ignites interest in the forbidden’