Growing up during the second half of the Cold War, when I was a child the Soviet Union was notable for two reasons: nuclear weapons and censorship. That’s about all I really knew: the Russians and citizens of their satellites can’t read or watch or print what they want. Also they have enough warheads to make our assured destruction one of the mutual sort.

I know I’m constantly posting stuff from Open Culture here, but that site is so smart and their free-to-watch/read/listen to finds are a kind of palette cleanser for the shitty mall that most of the internet has become. I came across another great find on the site today, one that put me back in mind of those nights when I couldn’t sleep because I was worried about nuclear annihilation. You know — childhood for Generation X. Here’s a bit about Glass Harmonica, the only animated film ever banned in the Soviet Union…

At first glance, one would think The Glass Harmonica would fit right into the long tradition of Soviet propaganda films begun by Vertov. As the opening titles state, it aims to show the “boundless greed, police terror, [and] the isolation and brutalization of humans in modern bourgeois society.” And yet, the film offended censors due to what the European Film Philharmonic Institute calls “its controversial portrayal of the relationship between governmental authority and the artist.” There’s more than a little irony in the fact that the only fully censored Soviet animation is a film itself about censorship.

The central character is a musician who incurs the displeasure of an expressionless man in black, ruler of the cold, gray world of the film. In addition to its “collage of various styles and a tribute to European painting”—which itself may have irked censors—the score by Alfred Schnittke “pushes sound to disturbing limits, demanding extreme range and technique from the instruments.” (Fans of surrealist animation may be reminded of 1973’s French sci-fi film, Fantastic Planet.) Although Andrei Khrzhanovsky’s film represents the effective beginning and end of surrealist animation in the Soviet Union, only released after perestroika, it stands, as you’ll see above, as a brilliantly realized example of the form.

Stay Awake!

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While we all get tired of the endless holidays that have been squeezed into the calendar by charities, special interest groups and greeting card manufacturers, I’m happily celebrating Banned Books Week, which is happening now – from September 22 – 28.

BBW was started in 1982 when the dawn of Reagan’s America saw a rise in attacks on free speech in schools at bookstores and in libraries. Since its inception, Banned Books Week has documented more than 11,000 attempts to ban books — as reported by the American Library Association.

The censorship of literature was common even after WWII and it’s thanks to brave authors, publishers, editors and readers that we can now barely conceive of the draconian strictures that this country placed on books not-so-very-long ago.

William S. Burroughs’ Naked Lunch was one of the last books to be banned by the U.S. Government. You can listen to the whole book right here on my YouTube channel…

The American Library Association’s Office for Intellectual Freedom curates a multitude of banned books lists here. Browse a bit and see how many of your favorites have been attacked. For me, Naked Lunch, The Sun Also Rises, Catcher in the Rye, The Lord of the Flies and everything by Henry Miller are all indispensable reading. List your faves in the comments section.

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