The following dangerous books - and many others - can be found at your local Public Library. The dates refer to the year in which the book was challenged, banned or burned.
 | Aesop, Fables (585 B.C.) According to legend, the Greek slave and storyteller was flung from the cliffs at Delphi for sacrilege. |
 | Homer, The Odyssey (387 B.C.) Plato suggested that state censors should expurgate the outlandish adventures of Odysseus, and all other poetry. |
 | Shakespeare, William King Lear (1810) Banned from the English stage until 1820, in deference to the insanity of King George III. |
 | Darwin, Charles On the Origin of Species (1859) Fearing the outraged response to his epoch-making theory, Darwin kept the work in a desk drawer for 15 years before publishing it, amidst a firestorm of controversy. |
 | Eliot, George Adam Bede (1859) Condemned as the "vile outpourings of a lewd woman's mind" and withdrawn from British libraries. |
 | Whitman, Walt Leaves of Grass (1882) When this great American poem was banned in Boston for explicit content, Whitman bought a house with proceeds from the increased sales. |
 | Steinbeck, John The Grapes of Wrath (1939) Copies of this "ungodly" depression era epic were burned on the library steps in St. Louis, Missouri. |
 | Brown, Dee Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee. (1974) This Native American history was removed from a school library in Wisconsin by an administrator, who explained: "if there's a possibility that something might be controversial, then why not eliminate it?" |
 | Chaucer, Geoffery The Miller's Tale (1987) Denounced as "pornography and women's lib.," this bawdy 14th century story was declared off-limits for students in Columbia County, Florida. |
 | Rushdie, Salman The Satanic Verses (1989) Ayatollah Khomeini declared a death sentence on the author of this comic exploration of Good and Evil. Many bookstores do not stock the work, fearing violence. |
 | Anon., The Bible (1992) Challenged in Brooklyn Center, Minnesota as "lewd, indecent, obscene, offensive, violent and dangerous to women and children." |
 | Snyder, Jane Sappho (2000) Several juvenile biographies of homosexuals were removed from libraries in the Anaheim California School District, who claimed they were "too difficult." |
 | Pilkey, Dav Adventures of Captain Underpants (2000) Removed from a Connecticut elementary school for causing unruly behavior. |
 | Rowling, J.K. The Harry Potter series (2001) Subject of 448 challenges in 2001 alone, books from this popular series, together with Tolkien's Lord of the Rings, were burned outside a church in New Mexico, for being "masterpieces of satanic deception." |
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