The perfect book review: a ban

by Guardian blogger Nicholas Lezard Thursday October 2 2008

There's nothing like a ban to give a book a good reputation. The struggle between free thought and government is an endless one, but when someone bans a book, the book has won. Who did not yearn to read Lady Chatterley's Lover in order to see what the fuss was about? Who, now, knowing what the fuss is about, reads the book unless they are studying DH Lawrence? Solzhenitsyn, on being banned in the Soviet Union, achieved an almost unimaginable moral stature - certainly inconceivable in today's Russia.

My favourite book – I'm afraid it sounds both corny and pretentious to say this, but it has to be said – is Ulysses. It's my favourite book not because it was banned but because it's got everything in it. And that, I suppose, is why it was banned. Objections centred on its earthy elelements: Bloom has a poo. He masturbates at the sight of a young girl looking at fireworks. His wife reminisces lubriciously. But plenty of other things happen, too.

Read Lezard's full piece here.