New York (AFP)

The blacklisting of six albums by popular children's author Dr. Seuss for their racial stereotypes has sparked controversy in the United States, with conservatives denouncing yet another example of "cancel culture."

Among the titles removed from the list are "And To Think That I Saw it on Mulberry Street", which notably features a "Chinese boy", carrying a bowl and and chopsticks.

In "If I Ran the Zoo", characters with long mustaches appear in what looks like traditional Chinese attire.

"These books inappropriately and hurtfully portray characters," Dr. Seuss Enterprises, the organization that manages the author's estate, said Tuesday, revealing that the decision to withdraw was taken last year, in agreement with publisher, Penguin Random House.

“Taking these books off sale is just one aspect of our commitment and plan to ensure that the Dr. Seuss Enterprises catalog represents and supports all communities and families,” the group added in a statement released on Tuesday.

Several conservative figures immediately denounced a form of censorship in the name of political correctness.

They see it as a new example of the "cancel culture", which aims to tarnish the image or disrupt the activity of a personality or a company to force it to withdraw statements, images or products deemed offensive or discriminating, to apologize, or even to withdraw from public life.

"When history examines this period, it will be seen as an example of a depraved socio-political purge driven by hysteria and madness," tweeted Republican Senator from Florida, Marco Rubio.

Several observers noted that US President Joe Biden did not mention Dr. Seuss in a press release celebrating Read Across America Day, named after a program to promote reading among young people, unlike his predecessors Donald Trump and Barack Obama.

Asked Tuesday during her daily press briefing, White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki referred the journalists to the Ministry of Education.

- Sales take off -

Theodor Seuss Geisel (1904-1991), better known under the name of Dr. Seuss, became from the 1930s one of the most prominent references in children's literature in the United States, and his creations were exported in many countries of the world.

Dr. Seuss' books have sold over 600 million copies and the universe he invented has frequently been adapted for film, including "The Grinch" (two films), "The Lorax", or again "Horton".

The world of Dr. Seuss has often been criticized in the past for conveying, according to several observers, clichés about different ethnic communities, and has even been accused of promoting white supremacism.

A study published in 2019 by the Conscious Kid association, which promotes equality among youth, highlighted the use of caricatures for Chinese, Japanese, or Middle Eastern characters.

It also showed that the only two black figures seen in Dr. Seuss' albums were portrayed with only a loincloth, carrying wild animals.

The study also presented Dr. Seuss' animals as a vector of stereotypical racial representation, first and foremost the cat from the "Cat in the Hat", one of the author's most famous books.

According to several publications, the cat was inspired by the "blackface" culture, a caricatural representation of black people by white actors in make-up.

The work of Theodor Geisel and the man himself are complex.

During World War II, the illustrator produced more than 400 political cartoons for the New York daily PM, most of them criticizing American isolationism and attacking Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini or Joseph Stalin.

Several youth comic book authors born before the war have been criticized for their approach to minorities, in particular the Belgian Hergé and his "Tintin au Congo".

Since the 1980s and 1990s, representations have evolved and now generally avoid clichés and caricatures.

The controversy gave a boost to the albums of Dr. Seuss, which occupied, Tuesday at the end of the day, 14 of the top 20 sales places on the online shopping site Amazon.

On eBay, old copies of "If I Ran the Zoo" were selling for as much as $ 1,300 each.

© 2021 AFP