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Books are still being banned every day, but do you know which of the great classics have been banned? Books are controversial because of language, politics, sexuality, or religion. Some books seem to be challenged or banned because of multiple objections from different types of censors. Here’s a list of ten…

Uncle Tom’s Cabi... Stowe, Harriet Beecher Best Price: $1.10 Buy New $4.97 (as of 04:10 UTC - Details)

1. Ulysses – James Joyce

Published in 1918, James Joyce’s Ulysses was banned on sexual grounds. Leopold Bloom sees a woman on the seashore, and his actions during that event have been considered controversial. Also, Bloom thinks about his wife’s affair, as he walks through Dublin, Ireland on a famous day (we now know it as Bloomsday). In 1922, 500 copies of the book were burned by the United States Department of the Post Office.

2. Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain

Published in 1884, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, by Mark Twain has been banned on social grounds. Concord Public Library called the book "trash suitable only for the slums," when it first banned the novel in 1885. The references and treatment of African Americans in the novel reflect the time about which it was written, but some critics have thought such language inappropriate for study and reading in schools and libraries.

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3. Madame Bovary – Gustave Flaubert

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Published in 1857, Gustave Flaubert’s Madame Bovary was banned on sexual grounds. In the trial, Imperial Advocate Ernest Pinard said, "No gauze for him, no veils – he gives us nature in all her nudity and crudity." Madame Bovary is a woman full of dreams – without any hope of finding a reality that will fulfill her hopes. She marries a provincial doctor, tries to find love in all the wrong places, and eventually brings about her own ruination. In the end, she escapes in the only way she knows how. This novel is an exploration of the life of a woman who dreams too large. Here adultery and other actions have been controversial.

4. The Scarlet Letter

Published in 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter was censored on sexual grounds. The book has been challenged under claims that it is "pornographic and obscene."

5. Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Published in 1852, Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin was controversial. When President Lincoln saw Stowe, he purportedly said, "So you’re the little woman who wrote the book that made this great war." The novel has been been banned for language concerns.

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May 29, 2010