Banned Books - Arya S Binu

                             

Another evening of the book club meeting was spent on savoring “the forbidden fruit”, a discussion of banned books.

From dramatic court battles to bundles of books being burned in 1930s Berlin, impassioned attempts to censor the written word are nothing new, and even today restrictions continue across the world. Khaled Hosseini’s Kite runner was accused of offensive content, while the literary sensation Harry Potter series ruffled feathers with some religious groups, and 1945 ‘s  Animal Farm, criticized Stalinism,  to be popular on the ban list, at least in some countries or period.

The discussion was mainly focussed on the books Lajja by Taslima Nasrin, D H Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover, and Perumal Murugan’s Madhorubhagan owing to limited time.

Lady Chatterley’s lover privately published in 1928 before being picked up by Penguin in 1960; storied the wealthy married woman's affair with her working-class groundskeeper, raising eyebrows. Many attributed the D H Lawrence masterpiece with helping to usher in the sexual revolution of the 1960s in the UK. The acquisition led to Penguin being tried under the Obscene Publications Act due to the book's detailed descriptions of sexual scenes. The ruling "not obscene", resulted in a sales hike, due to the spectacle created by the trial.

Lajja by Taslima Nasrin was banned in Bangladesh due to the religious extremism it depicts. The controversial bestseller takes a look into the family of Datta's, members of a small Hindu minority, who have lived all their lives in Bangladesh. With the 1992 destruction of the Babri Masjid, in the neighboring land, their world begins to fall apart.
Madhorubhagan, (one part woman) is set a century ago. An account of a poor, childless couple, and how the wife, who wants to conceive, takes part in an ancient Hindu chariot festival, which happens on one night of the year when sexual taboos are relaxed, and consensual intercourse between strangers is permitted. The tyranny of caste and pathologies of a community is explored in this enthralling fiction. Finding this hard to digest, the author was hounded by right-wing activists alleging the book hurt their religious sentiments.

In approaching censorship of books, a very thin line lies between respecting the subjective perception of the author and the efforts to dilute the influence of extremists or preserve the wellbeing of the vulnerable.

Bookshelf:
Meesha (Moustache) – S Harish
All Quiet on the Western Front - Erich Maria Remarque
Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov