9 Books Censored or Destroyed for Challenging Religion

7. Expelling the Atheist: The Necessity of Atheism (1811)

Even as late as the 19th century, blasphemy was still an arrestable crime in England.

In 1811, while a student at Oxford, the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote a strongly worded pamphlet called “The Necessity of Atheism” and quietly scattered a few hundred copies around the grounds.

In his one act of caution (possibly ever), Shelley left his name off the pamphlet, signing only “An Atheist.” But no one who knew Shelley was fooled – between the mastery of language and the sheer nerve, every finger pointed right at the 19-year-old poet, and he was hauled in front of the Oxford deans. When he didn’t deny it, they expelled him.

This had such a devastating effect on his career that he had to settle for becoming one of the finest poets in the history of the English language.