As I am sure you all know Harry Potter is a recent example of a book that is burned for what it supposedly p0rtrays. While I will not deny that it has magic and it has witches and wizards, as hopefully all you know it is done in a very general fantasy way rather than in sell your soul to the devil kind of way. That being said it irks me that people in the US today can go about burning books, and not just any books but well written, and mostly harmless books. There are many more books out there that can be shown as Satan targeting the minds of people (The erroneous Da Vinci Code), and children (The Golden Compass Trilogy). I have had the misfortune of reading both. While I will not put myself forward as a literary Genius I have found that these novels (Da Vinci and Golden Compass), are captivating reads. The big problems with them is their attacking of a religious faith (specifically Catholics, we can include Mormons in this if we include A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (also another fun read) but I feel it unnecessary) Now I can forgive the Da Vinci code a little in it's attacks on the Catholic Church because the story is targeted to adults and not children, and as responsible adult americans, we can make up our own minds, but the Golden Compass I cannot. The Golden Compass's protagonists are a young girl named Lyra (11 years old) and Will (12 years old) I don't know about you but it is a little tough for me when a novel that has obvious anti-church sentiments is targeted towards young readers. The book has many adult themes, and while it doesn't have any "steamy" scenes there are plenty of illusions to sex and many other adult themes. Now they are making it into a movie, and are going to raise public awareness of it once more I just hope parents read it before their tractable young children get a hold of it.
Well I have sort of gone on a rant about a novel when my first point was book burning was bad. What I think is better is parental filtering of a book and knowledge of their children's stories, that while an award winning children's book may look harmless a closer look would be wise, and conversely another book may look harmful may also deserve some research into the actual storyline and (heaven forbid) spoilers into what really happens in the book.
Sorry for being so silly and long winded, I just see trouble in a children's movie being based off of these books.
-Joe (Reader of too many books)
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4 comments:
interesting! we should chat more about this--I'd like to hear more about golden compass. It's certainly an issue today--we'll chat. Go Joe!
joe -
Whoa. So how do you really feel about it?
Joe,
I fully agree with you about the need for parental filtering. At our children's age, we haven't run into many books that we've found objectionable, but movies are another story. There are even some Disney movies that we won't let our kids watch. Just because it's animated, made by Disney, or based on children's literature, doesn't necessarily mean it's ok. Thanks for the heads-up on the Golden Compass!
I am with you too joe...on both points....burning books and parental filtering. There are some books that really are not meant for children that are on the shelves and very popular. It is hard to keep up with it as a parent. I remember reading the Gift Giver which was a very big chapter book for 10 year olds...I was stunned by the subject matter and felt that it would be too mature for a child that age without a lot of guidance from a parent. It raised such difficult questions about cloning that I was amazed that it was a book recommended for any child in elementary school. I like the idea of lots of dinner table and "riding in the car" conversations about what a child is reading so that things that a parent isn't always aware of can come up.
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