Authors – The Right to Write

I have never agreed with censorship; I don’t mean that everyone should be free to behave exactly as they please, they shouldn’t and of course we do need laws to protect the vulnerable but when it comes to adults why should we be subjected to the ideologies of others when it comes to deciding what we can and cannot read, see, watch or hear? Banning books is ridiculous, banning films and television programmes, songs and speeches too. It doesn’t work, when something is banned it only serves to make it more desirable, humanity loves to have things it’s not meant to and we always want what we can’t have. 

As long as no living thing is unnecessarily harmed in the making of a book, a film or whatever, then we should not be refused access to it, and those who produce these pieces of art should not be subjected to oppression,or punitive punishments. You should not fear for your life just because somebody else does not agree with what you have written; it is a small step indeed from mere censorship to the removal of all unapproved literature from our shelves and living in a Dystopian society where books are contraband.

This week saw Egyptian author Ahmed Naji imprisoned for two years after explicit extracts from his novel were published in the national press. The case was brought by a private individual who complained that the  passage “caused him distress and heart palpitations.”

How ridiculous! You are an adult, put the paper down and stop reading it if you do not like what you are reading. Initially it seemed that the Egyptian courts agreed and Naji was acquitted but prosecutors appealed and the author has now received a custodial sentence. (he can appeal)

Not only that, this week the Fatwa on British author Salman Rushdie has been reinstated with Iranian news outlets stating that a $600,000 reward for his assassination has been added to the $3 million that the Ayatollah Khomeini placed upon Rushdie’s head in 1989 after the author’s novel The Satanic Verses was published.

This comes after the news that five publishers associated with Sage Communications in Hong Kong have either disappeared or been detained by Chinese authorities after they produced a novel that criticised the Chinese leader Xi Jinping. This book has now been suspended and withdrawn from sale amid fears of further reprisals.

This is worrying news indeed don’t you think? Authors should not live in fear, they should not hover over their keyboards wondering if the story they want to write will end up with the imprisoned, or even end their lives. Are these isolated cases, or is this something we are going to see happening more and more often as those in power seek to mould the world into their ideal and quash anyone and anything that dares disagree, question or discomfit them?

Let us hope it’s the former.