Speaking on children's book censorship on WTVP's "At Issue"

I will be discussing children's book censorship on the Peoria PBS roundtable discussion show, "At Issue."  The show will air tonight (Thurs, Jan 10) at 8:30 pm on WTVP-HD, on FridaJan Susina speaking on WTVP's "At Issue"y at 8:30 pm on WTVP-World and Sunday at 4:30 pm on WTVP-HD.  Click here for a link to the show information.

Moderator H Wayne Wilson asked me to participate in the discussion about issues concerning censorship and banning of children's and young adult books.  Since I talk about this often in class, I was glad to contribute.  While book censorship may be somewhat on the decline, choosing which books to teach in a class is a difficult challenge for all teachers.  So in my classes I focus on helping education majors understand how and why they choose books and to be able to defend them as appropriate for the classroom.  Two librarians discussed issues of censorship by their patrons.  They noted that censorship is not too prevalent in the Peoria region.  However, challenges to books by parents continues throughout the country, including Illinois.

Thanks to H for inviting me.  He was a very thoughtful leader, just like Charlie Rose.  The other panelists -- Genna Buhr of the Fondulac District Library and Robert Koscielski who is the Associate Director of the Peoria Public Library -- were also engaging and had good perspectives on the topic as well.

New Emma series on PBS

The library has bookmarks advertising a new PBS series based on Jane Austen's Emma so I had to check out the PBS website to see what the show is going to look like. Screenwriter Sandy Welch says she wanted to focus on the modern aspects of the characters in Emma, but she's also very aware of previous interpretations, including the film Clueless.  Emma, as you may remember, is a character who's not quite as lovable as some previous Austen heroines.  In fact Mr. Knightley laments how little Emma has taken up on the suggested reading plan he gave to her.  Gillian Dow has a good discussion of the kinds of books women were reading during the Regency Era.  Which begs the question, have you read a few of these books which were considered important for well-educated women at the time: Ann Radcliffe's The Romance of the Forest (1791), Regina Maria Roche's The Children of the Abbey (1796), Stephanie-Felicite de Genlis's Adelaide and Theodore (1782), Maria Edgeworth's Letters for Literary Ladies (1795), and Frances Burney's Evelina (1778).