Solzhenitsyn’s The Gulag Archipelago has been banned by Guantanamo Bay authorities. Shaker Aamer, a UK citizen incarcerated at the camp since 2002, has been refused a copy of the novel, as stated by Reprieve, the British prisoners’ rights group.
Aamer’s legal team, who often bring him books, handed over a copy
of the Solzhenitsyn classic, but the prisoner says he never
received it. Aamer is an avid reader, citing George Orwell’s 1984
as one of his favorite books.
The Saudi Arabian-born inmate has the dubious distinction of
being the last UK citizen at the camp, although he was due for
release in 2007. Despite requests from the British prime
minister, he is still languishing in the prison.
Aamer is known around the camp for his wide reading and eloquent
command of language. In fact, according to a New York Times
article from 2006, he has been dubbed "the professor". Also,
famous singer/songwriter P.J. Harvey recently penned a song about
him called simply ‘Shaker Aamer’.
Clive Stafford Smith, Aamer’s attorney, had strong words to say
about the draconian censorship measure.
“This is yet another demonstration of how Guantanamo is
destroying the very values the US once stood for. When your
country’s government starts barring books once banned by the
Soviets, alarm bells should ring," he said.
However, censorship prevails at the camp and the Guantanamo
authorities have the power to ban any book or publication they
deem unfit. They do have a library of some 18,000 titles,
including books, magazines and DVD’s, with the Harry Potter books
reported to be a big hit with prisoners. And according to Reuters
the ‘Fifty Shades of Grey’ series is also popular with detainees.
It’s not the first time that Gitmo has hit the headlines in
respect of its literary censorship activities. Last summer,
celebrated author John Grisham found that some of his legal
thrillers were barred from Guantanamo because of what the camp’s
officials call ‘impermissible content’.
This prompted Grisham to write a letter to the New York Times in
which he denounced the camp in the strongest terms, calling it
“a sad perversion of American justice.” Later, a Pentagon
spokesman blamed the over-zealousness on “a misunderstanding
by some junior staff of what constitutes permitted reading
materials.” Grisham’s books are now on the shelves of the
Guantanamo library.
It is somewhat ironic that Solzhenitsyn’s story about the Soviet
Union’s notorious prison camps should be banned at another camp
of infamy. The Gulag Archipelago, a penetrating look at the
horrors and rigors of Soviet camps, was banned for decades in the
USSR.
Perhaps, as with John Grisham’s novels, the Solzhenitsyn classic
is another victim of a “misunderstanding” in the Gitmo censorship
department.