The 1988 children’s book Guess What? by best-selling Australian author Mem Fox has been banned in the Jacksonville county of Duval by the state’s ultra-conservative governor, Ron DeSantis.
The book, which is about a witch named Daisy O’Grady, seems to have violated Florida’s family rights in the education bill, also known as the “Don’t say gay” law.
This law was pushed by DeSantis, who is widely seen as Donald Trump’s biggest rival in the 2024 presidential race.
Guess What? was banned in Duval schools because of a law in Florida that says adults can’t give out “any picture, photograph, drawing… of a person or part of the human body that depicts nudity or sexual conduct, sexual excitement, sexual battery, bestiality, or sadomasochistic abuse and is harmful to minors.”
The pictures in the book, done by Vivienne Goodman, show the main character, O’Grady, taking a bath.
The Guardian asked Fox for his thoughts because he wrote Possum Magic, the best-selling children’s book in Australia.
In a statement, her lawyer said, “We have nothing to say about this.” Duval County is a county in Florida with 997,000 people. It doesn’t matter.”
The freedom of speech in literature group PEN America says that hundreds of books have been taken out of school libraries since the bill was passed. Florida school officials were told to “err on the side of caution” when the bill was passed.
The group said it had found 565 books that had been banned in Florida since 2021. With the passing of new laws earlier this year, some Florida schools were told to “empty libraries and cover classroom bookshelves.”
Teachers in Duval and Manatee counties were told that each book in their classrooms had to be reviewed before they could go back to work, according to PEN America. Works by Margaret Atwood, Arundhati Roy, and Nobel laureate Toni Morrison were among those that were taken away forever.
Guess What? has been banned in the US before. It is on the list of the 100 most often challenged books from 1990 to 2000 by the American Library Association.
This is because it is said to have a good view of the occult, the supernatural, and punk rock. It looks like the ban in Florida is the first time the book has been called “pornographic.”
The Guardian wrote earlier this month that teachers in Florida had to take down one-third of the books on their classroom shelves, including collections of Emily Dickinson’s writing.
