This week is special. From now until Oct. 3, we celebrate and pay homage to one of our most basic freedoms: the right to “seek and express ideas, even those some consider unorthodox or unpopular.” That’s right, it’s Banned Books Week!

The official celebration (check out bannedbooksweek.org, site of the above quote) began in 1982. My big sister brought me home a stack of books most often “challenged.” I remember her handing them off, letting me know loud and clear that no one, ever, should be allowed to censor what someone else reads.

Now, I’m going to just go right ahead and say this: Not all of the books were great. “I Am the Cheese” by Robert Cormier (published in 1977)? Yeah, I do not love that book. In fact, I think it’s fair to say, I’m not even sure I like it. I sure do remember it, though. I found it unbearably sad and tragic. But just because I didn’t like it or even if a lot of people didn’t like it, that’s no reason to ban it.

To declare that a story or an idea may not be read or shared … that’s crazy talk. That is the stuff of Orwellian nightmares (George Orwell gets challenged a lot, by the way) and fascist regimes. Banning books is the ultimate mark of fear and ignorance. Surely a nation based upon freedom of speech and thought would never even contemplate it.

Ah, if only.

In reality, books get challenged all the time. Sometimes, it’s not even the ones you expect. One that consistently makes the American Library Association’s Top 20 list of challenged books is “Captain Underpants” by Dav Pilkey. Seriously.

Now, is “Captain Underpants” high literature? No. No, it is not. But you know what it is? Funny. Maybe not to you, maybe not even always to me, but there are a whole slew of elementary school kids who will shoot milk out their noses if they read a page mid-gulp. Hook ’em on the Captain and before they even know it, they are readers. What’s more, the author is very open about his own struggles with dyslexia, which means that for readers who struggle, we are now in role model territory.

Other “frequent mentions” include all the Harry Potter books and the Bad Kitty series, too. Please don’t think, however, that we are only talking about kids’ books. No, no. Also on the Top 100 list for the past decade: “The Color Purple,” “Huckleberry Finn,” “A Catcher in the Rye,” “Nickle and Dimed” (Really? A book on wage inequality makes the list?), “Beloved,” “The Giver” and “1984,” to name just a few.

All of these books have been deemed “unworthy” by someone for some reason. And I’ll admit, sometimes for reasons I feel some sympathy with. Mark Twain used some words that are, context not withstanding, offensive. Some of these books are also disturbing, disquieting. Some are just not well written. And some are life-changing fantastic. At least I think so.

Regardless, all deserve to exist.

This week, go to your public library or local, neighborhood bookstore and pick up a good book. Revel in the knowledge that those ideas, printed on paper and bound into a book, are yours to explore. Happy Banned Books Week.

Comments are not available on this story.