Why Stephen King's Books Are Banned In Florida Schools

When a society starts banning books, it's a sure sign trouble is on the way or has already arrived.

When the Nazis began banning and burning books in 1930s Germany, President Franklin D. Roosevelt said, "Books cannot be killed by fire. People die, but books never die." Viewing the Third Reich as a threat not just to democratic rule but also humanity in general, Roosevelt added, "No man and no force can take from the world the books that embody man's eternal fight against tyranny. In this war, we know books are weapons."

It is now 2025 in the United States, and trouble has crossed the threshold and tracked muddy ignorance all over the nation's living room. What happens next is a source of profound worry for anyone who paid attention to President Donald J. Trump's campaign promises of prosecuting those who've challenged him in government and/or in print. All we can do is wait and see if he follows through on these threats.

In the meantime, we can look to the unsettling rise in book banning across the country as a chilling preview of coming attractions. According to the free-speech advocate PEN America, book bans in U.S. public schools nearly tripled over the 2023-2024 academic year. Meanwhile, a 2024 report from the American Library Association's Office for Intellectual Freedom showed a record 4,000-plus unique titles had been targeted for banning the year prior.

One author who's been under increasing fire from censors is Stephen King. This, sadly, makes sense given that he's one of the most prolific writers working today, and he specializes in the oft-controversial genre of horror. But some of the King books (many of which have been turned into great movies) that have been removed from public schools, particularly in the currently deep red state of Florida, aren't horror at all and contain little in the way of objectionable material. So, what gives?

According to a 2024 Newsweek article, over 60 Stephen King books have been banned from Florida's public schools. Considering that King has published 65 books to date, that means pretty much all of them are gone from the shelves. To clarify, some counties have banned more King titles than others. For example, Clay County, which includes much of suburban Jacksonville, went above and beyond by removing King's entertainingly instructive "On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft." Aside from some profanity, I can't think of a single reason why that book would be harmful to minors.

And that's really what this is all about. As Deborah Caldwell-Stone of the ALA's Office for Intellectual Freedom said in 2024, "The rhetoric about book banning right now is built around this falsehood that books touching on sex or gender identity, sexual orientation, or deal with what's called critical race theory are legally harmful to minors." The term "legally harmful" is the stretchiest of stretches, and it's an especially odd charge to level at King's writing. The man is certainly not a fan of Christian zealotry (starting with his first novel, "Carrie," which is vital young adult fiction), but when his books get political, it's usually about social justice or authoritarianism. Questioning authority, however, is anathema to a government determined to impose its proscriptive will on its citizens. This makes King a dangerous merchant of ideas.

What does King think about all of this? When Florida's banning spree kicked into overdrive, he tweeted, "Florida has banned 23 pf [sic] my books. What the f***?" Later, he reiterated his rule of thumb when it comes to the censorship of literature, "I have said it before, and will say it again: When books are banned from school libraries, run to your public library, or the nearest bookstore, and read what it is your elders don't want you to know." Amen, Mr. King.