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May 15, 2006

Index of Forbidden Books

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Opus Dei critics, the Opus Dei Awareness Network have obtained a copy of the organization's "Index of Forbidden Books" (Excel file). Well, this sort of thing is right up my street. I love lists and a list of things I am not meant to be reading can only come in handy.

There are 6,892 books with the highest rating of "6." Examples of authors who have some books with a "6" rating are: Woody Allen, Isabel Allende, Karen Armstrong, Margaret Atwood, Judy Blume, Roberto Bolano, Joseph Campbell, Gustav Flaubert, Allen Ginsberg, Mary Gordon, Gunter Grass, Andrew Greeley, Herman Hesse, Adolph Hitler, John Irving, James Joyce, Carl Jung, Eugene Kennedy, Jack Kerouac, Stephen King, Milan Kundera, Hans Kung, Harold Kushner, Henri Lefebvre, Doris Lessing, Sinclair Lewis, Richard P. MacBrien, Mary MacCarthy, Malinowski, Karl Marx, Somerset Maugham, Toni Morrison, Alice Munroe, Vladimir Nabokov, V.S. Naipaul, Pablo Neruda, Nietzcshe, Octavio Paz, Harold Pinter, Marcel Proust, Philip Roth, Bertrand Russell, John Updike, Gore Vidal, Voltaire, Alice Walker, Gary Wills and Tennessee Williams.

Examples of authors who have some books with a "5" rating are: W.S. Burroughs, John Cornwall, Marguerite Duras, William Faulkner, Nadine Gordimer, Eugene Kennedy, Jack Kerouac, Stephen King, Barbara Kingsolver, Doris Lessing, John O'Hara, A.J. Quinnell, Ayn Rand, Salman Rushdie and Kenneth Woodward.

Though quite why "The Stand" gets a 6 and the stalker-fan in "Misery" only rates a 3 is beyond me. Kipling does better with almost straight ones while Flea-fav Jacques Lacan gets naughty sixes for his "Ecrits" and his second seminar, "The Ego in Freud's Theory and in the Technique of Psychoanalysis 1954-1955". Whether through irony or slow updating Dan Brown's bestseller does not make the list. Given Opus Dei's new marketing campaign it is difficult to say if it is a forbidden 6 or mandatory reading.

That is Asia Argento introducing the post, btw. You tell me how to illustrate an index of forbidden books.

Posted by Ghost of a flea at May 15, 2006 10:00 AM

Comments

You know, that's a job I'd really like -- book rater for ultra-conservative groups...

Posted by: Ben (The Tiger in Exile) [TypeKey Profile Page] at May 17, 2006 09:56 PM