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Mother Goose Satire Removed
from N.Y. School Library

Whitney Point (N.Y.) Central School District has pulled The Inner City Mother Goose from its middle-school library after a parent complained that the book contained poems on topics such as prostitution and street crime.

Whitney Point Superintendent Dale S. Schumacher told the Binghamton (N.Y.) Press and Sun-Bulletin April 18 that a school-district committee, including the school’s librarian and principal, carefully reviewed the book and determined it was “not the appropriate maturity level” for middle-school kids.

The book had been in the library for four years but was never checked out until a boy took it home last week. When the student’s father saw the book, he called the principal to complain.

Critics have charged that the controversial book, first published for adults in 1969 and reissued by Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers in 1996, glorifies crime and drug use; the book’s defenders say it accurately portrays problems of the inner city.

Posted April 24, 2000.

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