“Our focus is literate theater, so we are naturally concerned by attempts to keep books away from people.”
So says Terry McCabe, Artistic Director of City Lit Theater, to explain how and why their theater began collaborating with the American Library Association in 2006 to put a spotlight on censorship. This collaboration, known as Books on the Chopping Block, began long before the banning of books became the almost a nightly topic on the news, that it is today.
Books on the Chopping Block helps shine a light on censorship and book banning by performing dramatic readings of excerpts from the ALA’s yearly Top Ten Banned Books in libraries and other public spaces in Chicagoland, coinciding with the ALA’s Banned Book Week, this year slated for ____
Here, Picture This Post (PTP) talks with City Lit’s Artistic Director Terry McCabe (T M) and Katy Nielsen (KN) on how and why their storefront Chicago theater sustains its passion to fight censorship, and other insights in their ongoing Books on the Chopping Block campaign.
(PTP) Could you please share with Picture This Post’s readers why and how City Lit Theater took up the cause of Banned Books?
(KN). “…we at City Lit are book nerds. We love text. I met Terry when he was my professor at Columbia College and I took his Text analysis class. We read a play a week in that class and dove deep into the texts. “What is the play ABOUT?” was always the question. All texts speak to the human experience, to something fundamental that connects us all. Language is fantastic and beautiful in that it can evoke these fundamental human experiences, challenges, truths etc. in so many different ways. We love text. We love performance and expression, so that’s what we celebrate. …Suppression of books, of text, of ideas, is the suppression of parts of the human experience; parts the suppressors wish to essentially erase. We are into exploring and expressing the human experience (truths, history) and allowing them to be understood, analyzed, discussed. Ultimately, this makes humanity better.
Terry started the project in 2006 after a discussion with Judith Krug, the founder of Banned Books Week at the American Library Association (ALA). I had just graduated with my BFA in acting from college, and reading in the performance was my first paid acting gig! I do remember that the readings were specifically in Evanston, and we read from a series of texts that had recently been banned from the school district’s curriculum –…it was the books that had been removed from that district’s curriculum and included The Things They Carried and The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
The following year, 2007, is when we adapted the top 10 countdown format. The ALA used to have big Banned Books Week events in Bughouse square back then, and invite the banned authors, and we would perform at that. Over the years, and since Ms. Krug’s death, the ALA has scaled back on the events, but we are glad that their Office of Intellectual Freedom is still keeping track of the reported challenges and keeping up with Banned Books Week online.
(TM) .. It was in 2006 after a phone conversation with Judith Krug, the founder of ALA's Banned Books Week. There was no specific banning that incited me to start the program, I was just looking for a meaningful outreach program for City Lit. It's a simple idea: we read brief excerpts of the books on the ALA's annual list, making sure that our excerpt exemplifies the specific quality the would-be censors find offensive. The excerpts are five minutes long, tops, so getting through the whole list in countdown order takes under an hour, and then there's an audience discussion we lead. I ran the program personally the first year and Katy was a reader in it; she has run it ever since because she's better at it than me.
Backtracking, could you please fill in Picture This Post readers who aren’t in Chicago about City Lit Theater?
(TM) City Lit was the first theatre in the nation dedicated to stage adaptations of literary material. We are the last-founded of Chicago's surviving 1970s theatre companies, that being the decade during which Chicago's off-Loop theatre movement blossomed. We're going into our forty-third season, and I believe we are the only longstanding Chicago theatre still committed to its original mission statement. The mission embraces the power and the beauty of the spoken written word in an attempt to explore the range of the literary imagination. Our bread and butter is still the adaptation of novels, short stories, memoirs, or other literary material to the stage. Much of what we do that isn't that is the commissioning and production of new plays by Chicago playwrights, including new musicals. And we have a thriving sideline in reviving plays that haven't been seen in Chicago in fifty, or seventy-five, or one hundred twenty years. We are unlikely—though it's not unheard of for us—to do a play that was a hit in New York a few years earlier. There are plenty of theatres in town that do a lot of that, and more power to them, but we prefer to produce shows that people don't expect to see.
Why do you think it is especially important for theater world people such as yourselves to play a leadership role in shining a light on book banning and challenges to First Amendment rights/artistic expression?
(TM) It's not a terribly elaborate idea. People who care about literature of whatever sort are offended by attempts to ban it. In the years I've been at City Lit, twice we've done plays that motivated people to try to get us in trouble for doing them. In neither case did the people in question actually see the play they claimed to be upset about. This is invariably the case with book banners too; last year in Texas there were 93 attempts to ban a total of 2,349 books, according to the ALA, and you know the 93 people never read that many books in their lifetimes. Always and everywhere the attempt to keep a piece of writing from being read or heard is a display of ignorance.
I wouldn't use the word especially in saying people in theatre should oppose censorship. Everyone should, equally. The ugly fact is that most people are in favor of some amount of censorship, as long as they get to be the censor. Everyone admires the Voltaire quote-- “I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”--but few people actually subscribe to it. As for theatre people: a few years ago someone announced plans to mount a production of David Mamet's play Oleanna in town. A small group of theatre people decided that the play is offensive and Chicago needed to be protected from it, and so they launched a social media campaign against the play and its would-be producers. Within a few days the venue that had agreed to house the production pulled out and the production was cancelled. No prominent voice in the theatre community, or in the theatre press, called out this community censorship for the disgrace it was.
Obviously—just look around—the overwhelming censorship danger in the country today is from the political right. But people of all stripes are willing to sign up to be other people's thought police. A well-intentioned lefty a few years ago criticized us online because that year's list included a children's book that employed stupid Frito Bandito-type pseudo-Hispanic stereotypical language. She offered the judgment that maybe it's okay for some books to be suppressed and urged us to “…do better.” Another year a librarian, of all professions, was interested in booking us to bring the program to her library but wanted to know if we might be willing to skip or replace one of the books on the list because she thought it was inappropriate.
An educated democracy is everybody's concern.
(KN) I agree with Terry that it is not especially important for theater world people to play an anti-censorship leadership role – it is important for anyone with the wherewithal to speak out to do so. Theater lends itself because it comes from text and audiences see it firsthand, but censorship comes in many forms. …I think it’s important to not lose sight of the goal, which is anti-censorship, full stop.
Books on the Chopping Block was very well received by Chicago audiences in the early years when the books being highlighted were about issues that audiences liked. But then later when problematic books were being challenged by people on the left, suddenly it was ok to censor them… This is exactly the kind of thinking we want to challenge. An Educated Democracy needs to have all the information in order to be educated. That includes problematic material like Skippyjon Jones, and books by problematic authors like JK Rowling. It does a disservice to the entire conversation to cut these books from the program. The books need to be presented and their problematic nature/issues addressed and discussed. Why are we mad about what is happening with the book? Why are trans people upset at JK Rowling? These are important discussions worth having. It’s easy to be excited about highlighting censorship when it aligns with your personal values, but the real work comes when the censorship is targeted at something you find problematic. That’s when you have to go deep and have the important conversations. Make no mistake, censorship efforts do not only come from the right.
Another example you can take or leave: for years I produced our Art of Adaptation Festival, and one year there was a piece adapted from an Emily Dickenson short story about a woman who was treated horribly at a party. It was a painful and incredibly real depiction of misogyny in everyday life. Unfortunately, we were not able to produce the piece because the director was unable to find actors who would perform it. They felt that “in this era of Me Too, it’s too hard to see these men get away with this bad behavior without suffering any consequences.” So by censoring a depiction of very real abysmal behavior, they were essentially working to erase the calling out of this behavior and the opportunity to discuss why it is wrong. Sweeping bad behavior under the rug does erase it – calling it out and addressing it is the only chance we have of correcting it.
(PTP) Who have been the main audiences through the. Years at the Books on the Chopping Block readings? Has this changed through the years?
(KN)Early on, there were larger audiences when the ALA would have the Bughouse square events, and that was mostly literary scene people and library folks and authors. Because the challenges are usually aimed at YA literature, there is a large audience of youth and teens for the readings. Many libraries will include their teen groups, and we have been booked at several high schools over the years. The suburban libraries are often very keen to host the programming and those are attended by the library friends groups, and patrons and their families. Every once in a while, we get a confused person who wanders in --haha. For a few years, we had received the Judith Krug grant that allowed us to present the program for free to libraries throughout the city of Chicago. This year, we have been approached by the women of Temple Shalom in Lakeview to do a special performance at their synagogue.
I remember the time a mother and her two very young children came in. I warned her that there were adult themes and adult language, and she acknowledged it. They stayed through the first few excerpts, even all the way through a short adaptation from 50 Shades of Grey. Next up in the presentation was The Hearse Song from Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark. Well, that was too much, apparently, and as the cast sang a lively rendition of “the worms crawl in, the worms crawl out,” the woman collected up her children and left.
I remember an older man in an audience who wanted to fight with me because he wanted to know why I had chosen “all these gay books!” I tried to explain that I don’t choose the books; that these are the most challenged books in the country – the people trying to do the censoring choose the books. But he refused to understand and basically accused us of pushing the gay agenda.
During the year that the problematic Skippyjon Jones books were on the list, I found myself leading that part of the reading with a trigger warning and acknowledgment of the racist undertones of the book. Then during the discussions, I made it a point to ask the Mexican members of the audience if they would like to share their opinions on the book at its challenges. 100% of the Mexican audience members who participated in this discussion agreed that the book is racist but disagreed with banning it because it’s important to talk about why.
I also have a disclaimer I read before any Harry Potter excerpts that acknowledges that we don’t agree with JK Rowling’s problematic stances on gender, however, we are still going to read the books and then discuss.
(PTP) How do you plan each year’s Books on the Chopping Block events?
(KN) Every year, the ALA releases the top 10 list in the spring and then I go to work adapting the Books on the Chopping Block script from these books. I will read the book, select an excerpt and then adapt it into script format. I also include a short introduction to each book and the list of officially stated reasons why the book was challenged and/or banned. I am currently putting together the current script. The goal is for the script to be about 60 minutes long when read by 4-5 actors. This year is a bit different, as the ALA list features a top 13 instead of a top 10 due to a couple ties. I will likely adapt a slightly shorter bit from each of the tied book titles to make up for time. The other option would be making each excerpt a couple minutes shorter; it’s all part of the creative Art of Adaptation, so we’ll see how it pans out. I should have the script adapted and to the actors by the beginning of September.
Casting for the project relies heavily on the demographics represented by the characters in the books. As much as is possible our goal is to have proper representation in casting. Of course, the actors need to be available for the tour schedule, so sometimes we are limited due to performer availability, but it is important to have the black characters read by black actors, trans characters read by trans actors, etc. All actors are paid, and everyone is encouraged to share their thoughts and opinions throughout the process.
(PTP) Can you also share with our readers your personal journey vis-à-vis developing passions to protest book banning?
(TM) For me it started with our first Books on the Chopping Block performance in 2006. Back then the whole book banning thing was more novel… people would be like, “what? Books get banned?” You can see how far we have come since then. Even in the early years, our discussions would start with, “well, these are ‘challenges’ to books, but that doesn’t necessarily mean the books are getting pulled from the shelves.” Fast forward to now when books are very much being pulled from shelves and out of kids’ hands as common practice. Banned Books Week used to be a fun thing I did once a year, and I am to the point now where I am resolved to make anti-censorship work a practice that I’m focusing on all year. What a time to be alive.
…We live in a time where all of us get our information from within echo chambers, social media, corporate news, etc. No one, on the left, right, or in between, is immune from propaganda. Our country is now saying the quiet part out loud; Equity, Diversity and Inclusion is flat out stated as a reason to pull a book from the shelf. What they call critical race theory is literally just American History. Being woke simply means being aware of facts. There is more to these censorship efforts than protecting children or whatever the suppressors are claim it to be. It’s about controlling thought and pushing agendas. There is the potential of real danger behind the controlling of information, and an educated democracy depends on having access to information. The more we can keep sharing stories and ideas, communicating clearly, and having real informed discussions, the more of an educated and empathetic society we can become.
For more information, visit the City Lit Theater online and especially their web pages about BOOKS ON THE CHOPPING BLOCK.
Read more about the Picture This Post Campaign to Stop Book Banning and Censorship.
Editor’s Note: Read more Picture This Post City Lit Theater stories here.
Images and videos courtesy of City Lit Theater of Chicago.
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About the Author: In 1933, Nazis burned works of Jewish authors, and other works considered “un-German”
About the Author: Banned Books Project Editorial Team
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