In Ray Bradbury’s dystopian novel Fahrenheit 451, protagonist Guy Montag revolts against his profession of incinerating banned books and the homes of their readers. His intellectual awakening sparks a series of events in which authorities scorch his home, robotic hounds hunt him, and his world is burned.
It’s an apt allusion with which filmmaker Kim Snyder begins and ends her documentary The Librarians, which premiered at the South by Southwest festival earlier this month. At a moment when our institutions of learning seem to be engulfed in flames, incited by right-wing witch hunts of diversity, equity, and inclusion, The Librarians reminds us how we got here and reveals, perhaps, how we can get out.
The documentary follows the librarians at the center of right-wing culture war attacks, starting from October 2021, when then-Texas state Representative Matt Krause launched an inquiry into school districts over their possession of books relating to race and sexuality. The 16-page list of 850 books included the children’s picture book And Tango Makes Three, a story of two male penguins who care for an egg together, and other award-winning children’s books. A couple of weeks later, Governor Greg Abbott doubled down on Krause’s reactionary crusade and directed the Texas State Library and Archives Commission, the Texas Education Agency, and the State Board of Education to clear books with “pornographic” content off library shelves. The Texas librarians featured in the film soon find themselves watching crates of books being carted away, their email accounts littered with death threats from ultra-right activists.
