>Listen to the children!

by Roger Sutton
Aug 14, 2008 | Filed in Articles & Opinion
>Maybe Sherry Jones, whose The Jewel of Medina was cancelled by Ballantine for fear of Muslim terrorist rage, was just working with the wrong division of Random House. The copyright page of each fall 08 Random House ARC I've received states "Random House Children's Books supports the First Amendment and celebrates the right to read."
Roger Sutton
Roger Sutton

Editor Emeritus Roger Sutton was editor in chief of The Horn Book, Inc., from 1996-2021. He was previously editor of The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books and a children's and young adult librarian. He received his MA in library science from the University of Chicago in 1982 and a BA from Pitzer College in 1978.

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Roger Sutton

>If Party A tells me Party B is going to blow me up unless I do what Party A wants (and then goes and tells Party B to blow me up) I'm gonna worry about A.

Posted : Aug 27, 2008 08:54

Anonymous

>In a sense, yes. But Ballantine wasn’t worried about Denise Spellberg driving up from Austin in a rage. They were worried because (to quote the Random House e-mail quoted in the WSJ piece):

"She thinks there is a very real possibility of major danger for the building and staff and widespread violence," Ms. Garrett wrote. "Denise says it is 'a declaration of war . . . explosive stuff . . . a national security issue.' Thinks it will be far more controversial than the satanic verses and the Danish cartoons. Does not know if the author and Ballantine folks are clueless or calculating, but thinks the book should be withdrawn ASAP."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121797979078815073.html

Denise’s predictive abilities are of course anyone’s guess. But she was never the threat.

Posted : Aug 27, 2008 07:18

Roger Sutton

>I would put a finer point on the last Anon's pencil: the gang of murderous fanatics was in this case one non-Muslim academic from Texas.

Posted : Aug 27, 2008 12:07

Anonymous

>I like Stanley Fish but in this instance I think he raises a point that is beside the point. So this isn't censorship. Granted and he's exactly right, but who cares? The point is that a major American publisher is giving a gang of murderous, medieval-minded, fanatics veto power over what they will publish.

Posted : Aug 27, 2008 01:20

Anonymous

>http://fish.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/08/24/crying-censorship/index.html

Posted : Aug 25, 2008 12:11

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