‘Packwood Report’ Offers Own Brand Of Obscenity
Blow out some candles. It’s time to celebrate Banned Books Week, and plunging a room into darkness is an appropriate metaphor for extinguishing the right to read.
Every year, the American Library Association shares a list of books challenged in schools and libraries the previous year. In 1994, the ALA’s Office of Intellectual Freedom reported 760 challenges.
I checked out some of the books on the list and was shocked - shocked - to discover what passes for literature these days. Be warned that I’m going to print some of the offending passages. Lock up the kids. Cover your eyes.
I’m also offering a bonus. A new book is out, “The Packwood Report,” a compilation of the testimony that sent Oregon’s Bob Packwood fleeing the Senate after years of sexually harassing staff members and campaign workers.
You tell me what’s obscene.
From “The Complete Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm,” cited for excessive violence, negative portrayals of women and anti-Semitic references:
“No sooner had the wolf said this than he made one pounce out of bed and ate poor Red Riding Hood up. … When the wolf had satisfied his appetite, he got back into bed, fell asleep and began to snore. … The gamekeeper was just walking past the house. …
“He found a pair of scissors and cut the wolf open as he slept. When he had made a snip or two, he saw the glint of the red riding hood and out jumped the little girl after a few more snips. … They got the old lady out alive, too.”
“Senator Packwood … grabbed her firmly with both arms around her shoulders, held her tightly, pressing his body into hers, and kissed her on the mouth. … She pushed him away.”
From Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prizewinning “To Kill a Mockingbird,” cited as a “filthy, trashy novel”:
“Uncle Jack gallantly bore me to the bathroom. While he cleaned and bandaged my knuckles, he entertained me with a tale about a funny nearsighted old gentleman who had a cat named Hodge, and who counted all the cracks in the sidewalk when he went to town.
“‘There now,’ he said. “You’ll have a very unladylike scar on your wedding-ring finger.’
“‘Thank you, sir. Uncle Jack?”
“‘Ma’am?’
“‘What’s a whore-lady?”’
While they were dancing, Senator Packwood pulled her close, put his hands on her back, and rubbed her back, buttocks and sides. … She pushed him away and tried to distract him with conversation.”
From Robert Cormier’s “The Chocolate War,” cited for themes of rape, masturbation, violence and degrading treatment of women:
“She was so beautiful that she made Tubs all shaky inside, like an earthquake going on. At night in bed, he could have one without even touching himself, just thinking of her.”
“When they got to her car … Senator Packwood pulled her toward him, put his arms around her back and kissed her, putting his tongue in her mouth. Hutton pushed away from him. …”
From Jane Smiley’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “A Thousand Acres,” cited as having “no literary value”:
“A glaring haze lay over the fields to either side of the road, and the rows of just-sprouted corn fanned into the distance like seams of tiny bright stitches against dark wool. … As I sat there enjoying the heavy, moist breeze, I let myself think, maybe this is it, maybe this is what turns the tide, and carries the darling child into shore.”
“Senator Packwood … grabbed her; when she tried to kick him in the shins, he stood on her feet. He grabbed her ponytail with his left hand, pulled her head back forcefully, and gave her a big wet kiss, with his tongue in her mouth.”