multiple occasions, most often for the stated reasons of explicit sexual content and depictions of violence. For instance, in Virginia, a parent initially brought attention to the novel’s explicit content in 1997 by passing out “packets of excerpts from The House of Spirits with the heading “Would you allow your 16-year-old daughter to read this material? And if not, why should the public school be allowed to require my 16-year-old daughter to read this material?” Despite this demonstration, the Virginia county’s school board voted not to ban the novel from school curriculum. Similarly, in Maryland, the novel was brought to the attention of the school board in Montgomery County for its explicit content, specifically the depiction of necrophilia—“in which a young medical student kisses a female corpse,” referring to the molestation of the body of Rosa the Beautiful. In California counties in 1999 and 2000, the novel was challenged for its anti-Christian views, pornographic depictions, and “violence and sexual abuse”. Traditions After the debut of The House of the Spirits, Allende began to follow a rule of starting to write all her books on January 8. She is quoted as saying: Film and theatrical adaptations In 1993, the book was adapted into a film (The House of the Spirits) by Danish director Bille August. The movie starred Jeremy Irons as Esteban Trueba, Meryl Streep as Clara del Valle Trueba, Winona Ryder as Blanca Trueba, Glenn Close as Férula Trueba and Antonio Banderas as Pedro Tercero García. While the film won some minor international awards, it was widely viewed as a critical failure. Two oft-cited reasons were its diffusely episodic structure and its cast of mostly Anglo-American actors in Latin American roles. The film was also a box office bomb, making back only $6.2 million of its $40 million budget. A theatrical adaptation of the novel was presented at Seattle's Book-It Repertory Theatre in 2007. The novel has also been adapted for the theater in a version written by Caridad Svich, which was commissioned by Repertorio Espanol in New York City. That adaptation premiered in 2009 and received the HOLA Award for Outstanding Achievement in Playwriting from the Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors. Unlike the film and the previous adaptation, this version was written and performed in Spanish and has been staged in Latin American countries such as Chile and Costa Rica. Svich also wrote an English language version of the