MSNBC’s Ali Velshi brings you “Velshi Banned Book Club,” an act of resistance against the book banning and censorship epidemic sweeping the nation. In each epis...
This episode of the Velshi Banned Book Club will confront the barrier to entry that surrounds poetry and tear it down by closely examining a masterclass in poetic storytelling: “Brown Girl Dreaming” by Jacqueline Woodson. "Brown Girl Dreaming" follows Woodson’s childhood split between segregated Greenville, South Carolina, and New York City. “Brown Girl Dreaming” is a beautiful look at childhood, identity, and racism in America. The Poetry Foundation's Young People's Poet Laureate from 2015 to 2017, Woodson proves that poems tell more in a few turns of phrase than many novels tell us in an entire chapter.
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Reading Rites of Passage
There is one thing that connects the disparate generations of Americans: books. This episode of the Velshi Banned Book Club will look at two novels that don’t just capture the spirit of growing up but punctuate chapters in an American student’s life: “Bridge to Terabithia” by Katherine Paterson and “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” by Stephen Chbosky. These books are frequently assigned in English classrooms across the county, and if they’re not, they’re passed from friend to friend. They are rites of passage in their own right. These books don’t share plot, characters, or scenery, but they both prove how serious childhood is, how painful growing up can be, and just how "adult" a topic a young person can handle.
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Star-Crossed Lovers
At first glance, the two books that make-up this episode of the Velshi Banned Book Club have very little similarities. Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” is a critical keystone to both the English language and the art of storytelling. Everyone knows Romeo and Juliet’s tragic love story. Dorit Rabinyan’s “All The Rivers” is a semi-autobiographic love story between an Israeli and a Palestinian student in New York City. Together, the two books critically examine the realities of family ties, cultural demands, and the power of love. This episode explores what a star-crossed lover truly is and the enduring power of love stories.
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Memoir as a Medium
What is braver than sharing your own story with the world? Nothing. This episode of the Velshi Banned Book Club will examine two true stories: “Hunger” by Roxane Gay and “The Glass Castle” by Jeannette Walls. While these two memoirs are windows into two vastly different worlds, they are both masterclasses in the age-old tradition of storytelling as a warning, as a lesson, and as a means to understand oneself. “Hunger” is a breathtaking examination of the societal demands of appearance and a salient reminder of how radical self-acceptance is. “The Glass Castle” is a searing examination of poverty, the intricacies of family, and the all-encompassing nature of mental health struggles. Together, they’re cultural touchstones and contemporary classics that need to be read.
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War in Literature
Heralded as one of the most enduring and salient novels in American history, “The Things They Carried”, written by Tim O’Brien, is a fictionalized account of O’Brien’s very real time as an infantry soldier in the Vietnam War. While, at its core, it is a Vietnam War novel, “The Things They Carried” explores the futility of all war, the power of friendship, and the motivating effects of morality, isolation, shame, and survival. This episode of the Velshi Banned Book Club will feature just one book, “The Things They Carried”, and explore its massive contribution to American literature.
MSNBC’s Ali Velshi brings you “Velshi Banned Book Club,” an act of resistance against the book banning and censorship epidemic sweeping the nation. In each episode, a different author joins Ali to discuss why their work is being targeted and what is so crucial about the literature itself. “Velshi Banned Book Club” is a series rooted in literary and cultural analysis, in the notion that reading is resistance. Read along with Ali.
Velshi Banned Book Club Season Two Reading List:
"Small Acts of Courage" by Ali Velshi
“The Giver” by Lois Lowry
“1984” by George Orwell
“How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents” by Julia Alvarez
“American Street” by Ibi Zoboi
“The Things They Carried” by Tim O’Brien
“Hunger” by Roxane Gay
“The Glass Castle” by Jeannette Walls
“Romeo and Juliet” by William Shakespeare
“All the Rivers” by Dorit Rabinyan
“Bridge to Terabithia” by Katherine Paterson
“The Perks of Being a Wallflower” by Stephen Chbosky
“Brown Girl Dreaming” by Jacqueline Woodson
“Persepolis” by Marjane Satrapi
“Maus” by Art Spiegelman
Velshi Banned Book Club Season One Reading List:
“Two Boys Kissing” by David Levithan
“Boy Erased” by Garrard Conley
“All American Boys” by Jason Reynolds and Brendan Kiely
“Dear Martin” by Nic Stone
“The Handmaid’s Tale” by Margaret Atwood
"The Tempest" by William Shakespeare
“Nineteen Minutes” by Jodi Picoult
“Give a Boy a Gun” by Todd Strasser
“The 1619 Project” by Nikole Hannah-Jones
“Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe” by Benjamin Alire Saenz
“Out of Darkness” by Ashley Hope Perez
“Speak” by Laurie Halse Anderson
“Ready or Not” by Meg Cabot
“Beloved” by Toni Morrison
“Their Eyes Were Watching God” by Zora Neale Hurston
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