GOOD Books: The Threat of Censorship

This week’s anti-SOPA action across the internet has GOOD thinking about the threat of censorship. High school kids nationwide are handed dystopian novels that warn against a Big Brother-like state, and celebrate the freedoms of our own society.

We

By Yevgeny Zamyatin

256 Pages. Harper. $7.99

Before there was 1984 or Farenheit 451, We invented the totalitarian super-state in which free will is considered to be the root of unhappiness. T

1984

By George Orwell

270 Pages. Signet Classics. $7.63

Orwell’s 1959 dystopian novel takes place in Oceania, a terrifying dictatorship of incessant government surveillance and public mind control orchestrated by En

The Palace of Dreams

By Ismail Kadare

208 Pages. Arcade Publishing. $20.

This 1981 novel was published in Albania, where, in accordance with the thematic movement of its narrative, it was immediately banned. The story pre

Fahrenheit 451

By Ray Bradbury

176 Pages. Del Rey. $10.

Bradbury’s 1953 novel presents a world in which reading is illegal. The book follows Guy Montag, a fireman responsible for burning books. The opening presents

The Sledding Hill

By Chris Crutcher

240 Pages. Greenwillow Books.  $13.25.

This 2005 postmodern metafiction caused many to wonder why all the kids were narrating books by omniscient dead boys and inserting themselves