Philip Pullman says he's delighted to discover his books have been challenged in the US, where 420 formal requests to have Northern Lights removed from libraries were lodged last year. According to the American Library Association, the complaints centred around the books' "religious viewpoint", presumably because of Pullman's Christian-sounding religious sect, the Magisterium.
It's easy for us liberals to write this off as more evidence of the craziness of Americans. (These people will be voting for a vice presidential candidate who wants to ban Harry Potter next!) But surely the line must be drawn somewhere. Are there books that we enlightened types would like to keep from our children? And who should decide which books they should be?
