Things have changed since my high school days and those before that. My father could recite all the counties in Ontario because that was deemed important yo know when he went to school early in the twentieth century.. I learned the main features of Canadian Federation with the acronymn, LACEFUR, because in Grade Ten we were supposed to understand the country we lived in. I no longer know what these letters stand for of course. Nevertheless if I needed the terms of Confederation again I could look them up - perhaps in an encylopedia. I still keep an Oxford Dictionary on the shelf to shed light to an unfamiliar word.

It’s just as well I don’t live in Escambia County, Florida - the state’s, westernmost and oldest county - because they have taken book banning to a whole new level, according to a favourite columnist pf mine in the Washington Post. They temporarily pulled Webster’s Dictionary from school shelves of along with other books, including the Guinness Book of World Records, much loved by young grandsons some years ago.

Horrors - think of all the words some kid could look up - perhaps, “black”, “white” - or even “they”. Sixteen hundred books were on the list - including two children’s Bibles. The good news is that a lawsuit against the ban brought by some publishers and writers’ groups is allowed to proceed.

Ann Patchett, an author I like, has protested the banning of one of her early novels, The Patron Saint of Liars. It’s not perfidy that is the objection here, but something she thought the book banners might actually applaud - like unwed mothers delivering their bobies at full tem giving them up for adoption.. You can meet her at her own bookstore- and on her Instagam account. Try the link here.

Anyone who thinks history can go away might be surprised.