Alberta Premier Danielle Smith slammed the Edmonton Public School Board Friday morning for its banned book list, which features more than 200 titles.<\/p>\n
The\u00a0internally distributed list, which CBC News obtained Thursday, was in response to a provincial government directive to identify books that are not age-appropriate and remove them from school library shelves.<\/p>\n
But the list included titles like\u00a0The Handmaid’s Tale,\u00a0The Color Purple, The Godfather and Jaws.\u00a0Books from authors like George R. R. Martin, Sarah J. Maas\u00a0and Maya Angelou are also on the list.\u00a0<\/p>\n
“Edmonton Public is clearly doing a little vicious compliance over what the direction is,” Smith said during an unrelated news conference.<\/p>\n
The point of this work is\u00a0to keep graphic, sexually explicit content\u00a0out of elementary schools, she said.<\/p>\n
Smith said the government will hold the school board’s hand, if needed, to help it identify what it deems appropriate for elementary, junior high and high school students.<\/p>\n
“We will more than happily work with them to work through their list, one\u00a0by one, so we can be super clear about what it is we’re trying to do,” Smith\u00a0said.<\/p>\n
The school board confirmed Friday morning that the list CBC News obtained\u00a0is accurate.<\/p>\n
Canadian author Margaret Atwood, who wrote The Handmaid’s Tale, declined to speak with CBC News, but noted in a social media post Friday that her novel was banned in Edmonton.<\/p>\n
“Don’t read it, your hair will catch on fire! Get one now before they have public book burnings of it,” she wrote.<\/p>\n
Hi kids .. #HandmaidsTale<\/a> (the book not the series!) has just been banned in #Edmonton<\/a>\u2026don\u2019t read it, your hair will catch on fire! Get one now before they have public book burnings of it.<\/p>\n