The National Coalition Against Censorship, with which I am affiliated, helps host Banned Books Week every year to raise awareness for the thousands of books which are challenged for removal in public schools and libraries every year.

Banned Books Week will be occurring between September 30th and October 6th this year, and to raise publicity ahead of the event my friend Chris Finan of the American Bookseller’s Foundation for Free Expression is helping run a “Virtual Readout”, where libraries, bookstores, and bibliophiles collaborate to read aloud passages from oft-banned books to help celebrate free speech.

This video, from the independent Arizona bookstore Bookmans, is especially powerful in the larger context of the powerful restrictions on speech in the Arizonan schools and the librotraficante movement which arose in response.

If you’re interested in contributing your own content to the Virtual Readout, you can do so on the Banned Books week website here.