A banned book by the Nobel laureate Toni Morrison will be available again to high school students in a district in St Louis, Missouri, after the Wentzville school board reversed its decision to ban The Bluest Eye, in the face of criticism and a class-action lawsuit.
The board made national news last month when it voted 4-3 to remove the book from school libraries, citing themes of racism, incest and child molestation.
Morrison’s 1970 debut novel is one of several titles, including Vladimir Nabokov’s Lolita, Gender Queer by Maia Kobabe and L8R, G8R by Lauren Myracle, to have gained the attention of school boards in conservative US areas.
The Wentzville ban was imposed after a challenge by a parent exercising the right to request titles not be available to their children. Backlash was swift, critics saying the board had violated first amendment rights.
In a letter of protest, the Intellectual Freedom Committee of the Missouri Library Association said: “We encourage you to reexamine the depth of your commitment to education in the truest sense, and to find your courage in the face of baseless political grandstanding at the expense of educators and students in your district.”
The American Civil Liberties Union of Missouri sued the district on behalf of two students.
According to the St Louis Post-Dispatch, the board accepted a review committee’s recommendation to retain Morrison’s book, voting 5-2 on Friday to rescind the ban.
An ACLU official, Anthony Rothert, welcomed the news but warned that books remain suppressed including All Boys Aren’t Blue by George M Johnson, Fun Home by Alison Bechdel, Heavy by Kiese Laymon and Lawn Boy by Jonathan Evison.
Challenges against two other books had been withdrawn, the Post-Dispatch reported. (Guardian)