Of Mice and Men: Banned

Recently, in our Honors ELA 10 class we read the book Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck. Our teacher informed us that the book was banned in some school districts. This somewhat surprised me because I had never heard that this book had ever been banned before. As we began to dig into the book I came to realize why.

I think one of the main reasons for the banning would be the language used or more so the swear words used in the book. Very often there were curse words in the writing, specifically starting on page four and continuing throughout the whole book. There was also the violent and graphic scenes that occured in the book, such as Lennie and Curly's fight and the killing of Curly's wife. Both were detailed and disturbing.

This makes me wonder though. Why censor students, and mainly older ones at that, by banning certain books? It's not like we have never seen or heard that graphic language and violence. I think that in trying to preserve how naïve we are, the officials overdue it a bit and refrain students from being able to read one of the most popular pieces of literature in our history.I believe the district(s) that have banned this book have taken it a little too far in that sense.