Authority’. This system of self-censorship succeeded in dampening much of the
controversy. (West 1988a: 43–53).
However, it had reverberations in Britain as well. In the years immediately following
the Second World War, American comic books were often imported; many British adults
disapproved of these publications, but they especially detested American horror comic
books. Marcus Morris, a Lancashire vicar, spoke for many when he called these comic
books ‘deplorable, nastily over-violent and obscene’. In 1955, as a result of the campaign
against horror comics, the importation of such comic books became illegal under the
Children and Young Persons (Harmful Publications) Act (Carpenter 1983:93).
The movement to censor comic books coincided with a period in American history
often known as the McCarthy era. During this period, conservative activists called for
the censorship of many forms of American culture, including movies, television
programmes, and novels for adults. Works of children’s literature, however, seldom
attracted much attention from these would-be censors. The major way in which
McCarthyism affected young people’s reading experiences was through a campaign to
ban certain adult novels from being taught in public high schools, which succeeded in
excluding numerous works. Favourite targets of these censors included political novels
that criticised America’s government or economic system and books that contained
profanity, such as J.D.Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (Nelson and Roberts 1963:182–
183). These censors tended to ignore children’s literature mainly because most
children’s books written in both America and Britain during this era were non-
controversial and unquestionably supportive of the status quo.
During the 1960s and 1970s, American children’s literature began to change. The
tradition of self-censorship that had been honoured by most children’s authors for
decades gradually began to break down. As Americans became more accepting of
sexuality and less confident in the infallibility of authority figures, a number of of
authors and editors questioned the legitimacy of the taboos that had encumbered
children’s literature for so long. This development resulted in the emergence of a new
breed of children’s books. The works of Judy Blume, Norma Klein and Maurice Sendak
dealt with the issue of sexuality, while other authors, such as Louise Fitzhugh, Paul
Zindel, and Robert Cormier, depicted adult characters unflatteringly. At the same time,
S.E.Hinton, Alice Childress, Isabelle Holland and several others wrote about
controversial social issues, such as gang violence, drug abuse and homosexuality. A
similar development occurred in British children’s literature, but not until the 1980s.
Scholars and critics began referring to many of these books as the ‘new realism’ in
children’s literature.
While several of these books raised eyebrows when they first appeared, few were
actually censored during the first half of the 1970s. This situation started to change as
the Moral Majority and other conservative religious and political groups gained power
and influence. As the leaders of these organisations urged their followers to speak out
against sex education, the teaching of evolution, and ‘sinful’ children’s books, the new
realism in children’s literature came under serious attack. This trend accelerated
dramatically in the early 1980s and has continued unabated into the 1990s. For the
most part, however, the conservative backlash against works of new realism has been an
American phenomenon.
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