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Banned Books Week: Most Frequently CHALLENGED Books

Celebrate the freedom to read! Learn more about Banned Books Week, book bans or challenges, and censorship.

Censorship By the Numbers

Censorship by the Numbers infographic

List of Challenged Books

Each year, the ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom records hundreds of attempts by individuals and groups to have books removed from libraries shelves and from classrooms. 

The titles below represent banned or challenged books on that list.

For more information see:

·         The 100 most challenged books for 2000-2009:
http://www.ala.org/advocacy/banned/frequentlychallenged/challengedbydecade/2000_2009


Banned and Challenged Classics

1. The Great Gatsby, by F. Scott Fitzgerald
2. The Catcher in the Rye, by J.D. Salinger
3. The Grapes of Wrath, by John Steinbeck
4. To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee
5. The Color Purple, by Alice Walker
6. Ulysses, by James Joyce
7. Beloved, by Toni Morrison
8. The Lord of the Flies, by William Golding
9. 1984, by George Orwell
11. Lolita, by Vladmir Nabokov
12. Of Mice and Men, by John Steinbeck
15. Catch-22, by Joseph Heller
16. Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley
17. Animal Farm, by George Orwell
18. The Sun Also Rises, by Ernest Hemingway
19. As I Lay Dying, by William Faulkner
20. A Farewell to Arms, by Ernest Hemingway
23. Their Eyes Were Watching God, by Zora Neale Hurston
24. Invisible Man, by Ralph Ellison
25. Song of Solomon, by Toni Morrison
26. Gone with the Wind, by Margaret Mitchell
27. Native Son, by Richard Wright
28. One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey
29. Slaughterhouse-Five, by Kurt Vonnegut
30. For Whom the Bell Tolls, by Ernest Hemingway
33. The Call of the Wild, by Jack London
36. Go Tell it on the Mountain, by James Baldwin
38. All the King's Men, by Robert Penn Warren
40. The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkien
45. The Jungle, by Upton Sinclair
48. Lady Chatterley's Lover, by D.H. Lawrence
49. A Clockwork Orange, by Anthony Burgess
50. The Awakening, by Kate Chopin
53. In Cold Blood, by Truman Capote
55. The Satanic Verses, by Salman Rushdie
57. Sophie's Choice, by William Styron
64. Sons and Lovers, by D.H. Lawrence
66. Cat's Cradle, by Kurt Vonnegut
67. A Separate Peace, by John Knowles
73. Naked Lunch, by William S. Burroughs
74. Brideshead Revisited, by Evelyn Waugh
75. Women in Love, by D.H. Lawrence
80. The Naked and the Dead, by Norman Mailer
84. Tropic of Cancer, by Henry Miller
88. An American Tragedy, by Theodore Dreiser
97. Rabbit, Run, by John Updike

Top Ten Most Frequently Challenged Books of 2016

The ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom (OIF) receives reports from libraries, schools, and the media on attempts to ban books in communities across the country. We compile lists of challenged books in order to inform the public about censorship efforts that affect libraries and schools. The top ten most challenged books of 2015 include:

  1. This One Summer, by Mariko Tamaki
    Reasons: LGBT Content,drug use,profanity,sexually explicit, mature themes
  2. Drama, by Raina Telgemeier
    Reasons: LGBT content,sexually explicit, offensive political viewpoint
  3. George, by Alex Gino
    Reasons: LGBT content, ' sexuality".
  4. I Am Jazz, by Jessica Herthel and Jazz Jennings
    Reasons: Inaccurate, homosexuality, sex education, religious viewpoint, and unsuited for age group.
  5. Two Boys Kissing, by David Levithan
    Reasons: LGTB content,sexually explicit
  6. Looking for Alaska, by John Green
    Reasons: sexually explicit
  7. Big Hard Sex Criminals, by Matt Fraction
    Reasons: sexually explicit
  8. Make Something Up: Stories You Can't Unread, by Chuck Palahniuk
    Reasons: profanity, sexually explicit, " disgusting and all around offensive"
  9. Little Bill ( series) , by Bill Cosby
    Reasons: criminal sexual allegations against the author
  10. Eleanor & Park, by Rainbow Rowell
    Reasons: offensive language