‘No book is written in a vacuum’: Politics has come for BookTok

BookTok, like the rest of America, is divided. “When did BookTok become political?” one creator asks in a video posted last week. “I am so sick of seeing these reader-unfollow parties. You guys, we are here to share books that we all enjoy… we don’t need politics ruining a good thing we have going.”

While some agree that BookTok is a space for sharing recommendations and making friends, many strongly disagree with her take. “She reads books like handmaids tale for the vibes,” reads one comment. “Did you… read the books?” another asks.

Books are inherently political, they say, so are the spaces online where discussions about said books take place. “If you’re gonna hold up that argument of ‘let’s keep politics out of BookTok’ but then also not allow people to talk about the politics of those said books, not to actually critically engage in the books, then I’m not quite sure what we can use BookTok for at all,” responds author Victoria Aveyard in a TikTok video. She goes on to say that “no book is written in a vacuum because no artist, no writer, no person exists in a vacuum.” Whether you’re reading romantasy or historical fiction, politics is unavoidable. 

Banning books is also a political reality. According to PEN America and the American Library Association (ALA), conservative groups tend to target books written by or about people of color and LGBTQ people, such as The Hate U Give, The Bluest Eye, Gender Queer, and All Boys Aren’t Blue. While liberal groups’ lists of banned books are far less extensive, they have singled out books with racist language or imagery like Of Mice and Men, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, and several Dr. Seuss titles. 

“We’re seeing organized political attacks on our libraries and on our school libraries, intending to limit books to what is politically approved, morally approved, that fits the narrow agenda of the groups that are bringing these challenges,” the director of ALA’s Office for Intellectual Freedom Deborah Caldwell-Stone told MSNBC in 2023. 

“Why do you think it is that when corrupt totalitarian governments and tirants come to power, one of the first things they do is ban books, burn books and come for artists,” adds BookTok creator Jack Edwards. “Artists are always one of the first targets because they question the status quo.”

It’s not a coincidence that Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale has surged to the top of Amazon’s best-selling books list following Donald Trump’s reelection. The dystopian novel, which takes place in a theocratic, male-dominated future America where the U.S. Constitution is suspended, media is censored, and women are forced to bear children for the ruling class (sound familiar?) has experienced a 6,866% surge in sales and currently occupies the top spot in Amazon’s literary fiction and political fiction categories. George Orwell’s 1984 and Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 have also seen a 250% and 333% rise in Amazon sales, respectively. Tell me again how books aren’t political?

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