Everyone knows that when a book is banned, it acquires a mystique that other books can only envy. While other books have all the mystique of a faithful husband who remembers to pick up milk and bread on his way home after work, the banned book has the mystique of the newcomer in town who has a curious scar on his cheek, about whom inarticulate rumors hint at a disgraceful past, and whose manners have a sinister unforced elegance.
Everyone also knows which books everyone wants to read.
So, on the theory that banned books are the most read, I urge all schools to ban these dark, dangerous, corrupting books:
Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson
Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott
Green Mansions, by W. H. Hudson
The Odyssey, by Homer
Robinson Crusoe, by Daniel Defoe
Ivanhoe, by Sir Walter Scott
The Autobiography of Frederick Douglass
Tom Sawyer, by Mark Twain
The King Arthur Trilogy, by Rosemary Sutcliff
The Mysterious Island, by Jules Verne
The Jungle Books, by Rudyard Kipling
There are libraries upon libraries of other books that should be similarly banned, but let’s not overwhelm our furtive young readers. There will be time in abundance to ruin them.
Books Matter 
Is that you, John Breitaupt? Interesting list. Tris
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Yes, it’s me.
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Of these, I haven’t read “Green Mansions”, but it seems as if I should. Dark, dangerous, and corrupting? That’s just the ticket.
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I need to read “Green Mansions”. If it’s as soul-corrupting as the others, it should be a good time.
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