OPINION: RUBY: The Value of Books, Part I

Jun. 3—I recently read a book titled The Librarian of Burned Books. It sparked my interest in learning more about the history of banning and burning books and the burning of books in Germany.

Hitler came into power in January 1933. He embarked on six years of implementing and shutting down the country's fledgling democracy. A basic goal became shutting down knowledge, because where knowledge leads is unpredictable, and control is about predictability.

By May 1933, Germany had blacklisted over 200 writers and banned at least 3,500 written works.

On May 10, college students in Berlin raided the university library and publicly burned the books in Opera Square. More than 40,000 people watched as more than 25,000 "Un-German" books were destroyed.

At least 22 cities across Germany followed suit, destroying an estimated 80-90,000 books (including those from personal family libraries and bookstores) in response to Joseph Goebbels' mandate, "No decadence and moral corruption! Yes to decency and morality in family and state!"

This movement was not without precedents. In 1817, "German student associations chose the 300th anniversary of Martin Luther's 95 Theses to . . . [demonstrate] for a unified country. [Germany was still a patchwork of states]. They burned anti-national texts . . . and literature which the students viewed as 'Un-German'."

Almost 100 years later, in 1914, German invaders in Leuven, Belgium, burned the University's library, destroying innumerable books, manuscripts, and professors' notebooks.

Who were the 1933 culprits? The German novel All Quiet on the Western Front (remade as a movie for the 3rd time in 2022) because of its pacifist message and its discrediting of German soldiers in WW I; Helen Keller's memoir, describing her belief in social justice and stating that she was a socialist; Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms for its depiction of German soldiers in WW I. Among many others, of course.

The internet abounds with articles about books and authors caught up in the web of banning and burning. But essentially, it all culminates in the attempt to silence voices you don't agree with—people, belief systems, cultures; " . . . rumblings about an unreliable press and rumors about political enemies that will threaten your family, your children."

It suggests a distrust of science and art and literature. "It comes cloaked in patriotism and love of country," making criticism a dangerous stance. And in doing this, it negates a basic foundation of democracy, which allows space for dissent, opposing opinions, and yes—freedom of speech and of the press.

The roots of denying that freedom date back at least to Roman Emperor Diocletian, who demanded the burning of bibles, and that any home possessing one should also be burned.

Hitler burned the works of Jewish, socialist, pacifist, and homosexual writers. Then he burned Jewish synagogues. Finally, he imprisoned and burned people.

In 1821, German poet Heinrich Heine wrote, "Where books are burned, in the end people will be burned." He wasn't being prophetic—his words referred to medieval Spain. Heine's books were burned in 1933.

Hitler wrote in Mein Kampf that smart readers would take from books only the ideas that supported their own beliefs. They would just discard the rest as useless, worthy of being turned into ash.

We depict Hitler as a tyrant, a bully, someone who imposed his personal vendetta against Jews on a whole population (and then kept expanding his definition of "undesirables").

But we should remember (or learn) that in the 1920s, Germany was that fledgling democracy, thought by some to be the most cultured country in the western world. A country that valued the arts, civil discourse, and intellectualism. That held a reverence for books. In short, a country that encouraged critical thought and free speech.

For a politician seeking ultimate power and control, these comprise threats that must be crushed. That can be crushed by sowing the seeds of distrust and rejection. By subtly turning learning into indoctrination to instill in the country's youth their own version of what education should be.

So, the book I read opened up a whole new desire to pursue this topic of banning and burning books, of how it connects to power and control. A topic that I find I can't cover in one article.

Hence the title of this one. Part II will follow as the next one that I write. Interestingly enough (at least to me), it will find me musing about Memorial Day and how censoring books related to our Armed Forces in World War II.