The city’s official bookworms are promoting pride in “rainbow reading” after the world’s largest bookstore punted books with homosexual themes from its lists on the weekend.
“We reflect the diversity of society’s interests and intellectual activity,” said Edmonton Public Library spokeswoman Pilar Martinez.
EPL staff sent out a Twitter update Sunday to reassure readers they weren’t de-listing any gay and lesbian materials.
More than 57,000 titles, including a long list of gay and lesbian books, were yanked from Amazon.com’s sales ratings list Sunday, and made almost impossible to locate on the site’s search engine.
A few titles began to reappear in searches by Monday afternoon.
Among the missing were Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain and James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room. Searches on Amazon.ca yielded 48 results under “homosexuality” yesterday afternoon, compared to hundreds that can be found on EPL’s website.
Pilar said Amazon’s faux pas reaffirms their decision to support the literature. Despite a few public complaints, the library has never removed a book with gay connotations.
