Stephen King Is Most-Banned Author in US Schools

A new report on book bans in US schools finds Stephen King as the author most likely to be censored and the country divided between states actively restricting works and those attempting to limit or eliminate bans. PEN America's "Banned in the USA," released Wednesday, tracks more than 6,800 instances of books being temporarily or permanently pulled for the 2024-25 school year. The new number is down from more than 10,000 in 2023-24, but still far above the levels of a few years ago, reports the AP, when PEN didn't even see the need to compile a report.

Some 80% of those bans originated in just three states that have enacted or attempted to enact laws calling for removal of books deemed objectionable—Florida, Texas, and Tennessee. Meanwhile, PEN found little or no instances of removals in several other states, with Illinois, Maryland, and New Jersey among those with laws that limit the authority of schools and public libraries to pull books. "It is increasingly a story of two countries," says Kasey Meehan, director of PEN's Freedom to Read program and an author of Wednesday's report. "And it's not just a story of red states and blue states. In Florida, not all of the school districts responded to the calls for banning books. You can find differences from county to county."

King's books were censored 206 times, according to PEN, with Carrie and The Stand among the 87 of his works affected. The most banned work of any author was Anthony Burgess' dystopian classic from the 1960s, A Clockwork Orange, for which PEN found 23 removals. Other books and authors facing extensive restrictions included Patricia McCormick's Sold, Judy Blume's Forever, and Jennifer Niven's Breathless, as well as numerous works by Sarah J. Maas and Jodi Picoult.

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Reasons often cited for pulling a book include LGBTQ+ themes, depictions of race, and passages with violence and sexual violence. An ongoing trend that PEN finds has only intensified: Thousands of books were taken off shelves in anticipation of community, political, or legal pressure rather than in response to a direct threat. "This functions as a form of 'obeying [in] advance,'" the report reads, "rooted in fear or simply a desire to avoid topics that might be deemed controversial." Says Meehan: "Some districts—in being overly cautious or fearful of punishment—will sweep so wide they end up removing Stephen King from access, too."