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Learning to Edit

Autobiographical Sketch Draft

This one-page marked typescript briefly describes how Robert Cormier learned his lesson to self-censor from Fabio Coen and tested that lesson on his then fifteen-year-old daughter. His thoughts on self-censorship appear in his essay “A Book is Not a House: The Human Side of Censorship” in Donald Gallo’s anthology Authors’ Insights: Turning Teenagers into Readers and Writers.

RELATED LINKS:

Pew Research Center survey results on self-censorship in journalism and salon.com's commentary on the findings.
http://www.people-press.org/2000/04/30/self-censorship-how-often-and-why/
http://www.salon.com/2013/11/12/american_writers_are_self_censoring_pen_survey_finds/

A professor's essay on teaching "offensive" material with comments on self-censorship practices of several canonical authors
http://www.thomaslarson.com/publications/essays-and-memoirs/203-severity-of-conscience.html