THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, March 2, 1996 TAG: 9603020002
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A11 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Editorial
SOURCE: Kerry Dougherty
LENGTH: Medium: 84 lines
One of the wonders of literature is how a select few books from childhood stay with you in vivid detail throughout your life. Tom Sawyer is one. Almost everything penned by Mark Twain is, for that matter. Others, too, are beyond forgetting: Robinson Crusoe, Little Women, The Diary of a Young Girl and Great Expectations.
Earlier this week the York County Public School Board exhibited an admirable respect for worthwhile writing when it rejected efforts by the parents of one eighth-grade student to ban another memorable modern classic: Flowers for Algernon.
I have deep philosophical problems with school boards banning books anyway. I think they ought to be in the business of encouraging children to read at all costs, not tossing out controversial books. But there is a more esoteric reason for rejoicing at the board's triumph of reason over raving.
No one who has read Daniel Keyes' 1959 novel could ever forget the wrenching story of the fictional Charlie Gordon, a mentally retarded man who spends the first 32 years of life in a dense mental fog.
After Algernon, a white laboratory mouse, is made a maven of the maze through brain surgery, Charlie becomes a candidate for the experimental treatment. The brain surgery is successful and suddenly he's a genius. His renaissance, love of learning and exquisite naivete are touching.
But most memorable is the moment when Algernon begins to regress, to lose the mouse equivalent of IQ points and finally dies. Of course Charlie realizes he faces the identical fate, yet carefully chronicles his descent back into retardation.
I wept at the end of this story.
But two York County parents missed the beauty of this book, the fine characterization and deep empathy for mentally handicapped people. Instead, they were upset about the accounts of Gordon's sexuality in the story (amazingly, since I read the book when I was about 12, I'd forgotten those passages. I had to seek them out in a battered old copy available from the public library).
Also troubling to the York County parents were mentions of alcohol consumption - another detail from the book I'd lost over the years. Imagine how bare library shelves would be if the consumption of alcohol in a story was grounds for banning.
Flowers for Algernon is one of about 34 books on the required reading list for some York County eighth graders. A ban by the School Board would have set in motion other challenges to controversial books like To Kill a Mockingbird which is also on the list.
To its credit, the School Board unanimously rejected the plea to scrap Flowers for Algernon. Board member Don Felling noted that he respected the parents' concern for their son and urged them and others to be vigilant about watching what their children read. Felling said censorship should happen at home, if at all. York County has always allowed children to substitute other reading material if parents find a particular book objectionable, he said.
That's reasonable.
Now that I have children of my own, I'm rediscovering classic children's literature. And what a wonderful experience that is - to get a second chance at Black Beauty, The Secret Garden and Kidnapped.
Frankly, I admit I'm sometimes startled to find mature passages in literature which gave me great pleasure as a young reader. For instance, I cringed at the racism directed at Injun Joe in Tom Sawyer. And I was a little squeamish last week when reading about cannibalism in Daniel Defoe's Robinson Crusoe.
Every night for the past several weeks my daughter and I have been reading Robinson Crusoe. As we conclude each chapter I'm struck by how much I've forgotten - and surprised by the details I remember. For instance, I'd forgotten just how much violence there was in Crusoe. But what stuck with me for 30 years was not the blood and guts, but the accounts of loneliness suffered by the Englishman shipwrecked on a deserted island for 28 years.
Would I rather my 7-year-old not know so much about cannibalism? You bet. Would I want her to miss the exciting adventure of Robinson Crusoe and his loyal friend, Friday - their deep friendship, and incredible patience as they wait to be rescued? Never.
As a person with a life-long passion for books I would hope that Flowers for Algernon would be one parents would nudge their children toward reading and schools would recommend. Most of us are better people for having shared Charlie Gordon's rise and fall. His story is one that stays in the memory long after the final page is turned.
by CNB