Challenged Works
About the Challenged Works List
This selective list provides information about numerous books and some magazines and newspapers that have been challenged in Canada and internationally in past decades. Each challenge sought to limit public access to these publications in schools, libraries, and elsewhere. Some challenges were upheld; others were rejected. We have tried to update our research on unresolved challenges.
Because some challenges are dismissed, the publications remain on library shelves or curriculum lists. We think it worthwhile to include such instances because the effect of a controversy over publications can spread, even though the would-be banners lose. A book or magazine with a controversial reputation can be quietly dropped from reading lists and curricula.
Report a Challenge
Because organizations and community groups that ask for book and magazine bans usually want to avoid public controversies, we often find it difficult to discover why challenges are launched or what becomes of them. If you know of book or magazine or newspaper challenges or, better still, satisfactory resolutions anywhere in Canada, please use our online case study form to report a challenge to the Freedom of Expression Committee.
Report a ChallengeSearch the Challenged Works List
The Day I Met Jesus: The Revealing Diaries of Five Women from the Gospels
Frank Viola ()Adult, audio book, fiction.
The Graveyard Books
Neil Gaiman (Author), Craig Russell (Illustrator) ()Children’s graphic novel, fiction, Volumes 1 and 2.
The Handmaid’s Tale
Margaret Atwood (1985)
Set in the near future, in a totalitarian theocracy which has overthrown the United States government, The Handmaid’s Tale explores themes of women in subjugation and the various means by which they gain agency.