Elton John joins protests at Venice's ban on gay children's books

Singer condemns ‘boorishly bigoted’ city mayor Luigi Brugnaro for removing picture books about same-sex families from schools

Elton John has waded into a row over the withdrawal of picture books about same-sex families from Venice’s schools, saying that the city’s mayor Luigi Brugnaro is “championing a future society that’s divisive and fosters ignorance”.

Brugnaro, who was elected in June, removed 49 books from Venice’s classrooms shortly afterwards, saying that he had “to think about the majority of families where there is a mother and a father”, and that the books needed to be examined to determine “which are, and above all which are not, suitable for pre-school children”. Following outrage from authors and the book trade – more than 250 Italian authors asked for their books to be withdrawn from Venice in solidarity – the initial list of 49 banned books was reduced to two, Francesca Pardi’s Piccolo Uovo (Little Egg), and Ophélie Texier’s Jean a deux mamans (Jean Has Two Mummies).

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