Burning Books

MATTHEW FISHBURN is a bookseller with Hordern House Rare Books in Sydney, Australia. He has taught at the University of Sydney and the University of Western Sydney. Together with Mark Tewfik, he is currently working on a book investigating the graffiti written on bombs during the Second World War. This is his first book.

• List of Figures List of Plates Preface Acknowledgments Introduction The Fear of Books The Burning of the Books The Library of the Burned Books To Hell with Culture Swing, they're burning books Beauty for Ashes Funeral Pyres Postscript: The Path of Cinders Bibliography

'Matthew Fishburn offers an original and often disturbing perspective on a dark chapter in literary history. He has a genius for drawing unexpected connections and he writes with the kind of elegance that was long ago banished from most academic books.' - Professor Jonathan Rose, author of The Intellectual Life of the British Working Classes and editor of The Holocaust and the Book'A fascinating chronicle. What makes Burning Books so impressive is the author's going well beyond the usual instances.' - John Sutherland, The Times'The book is supported by an excellent bibliography and notes, and there is a fine selection of reproduced posters, cartoons and photographs which enhance the value of the text.' - John Crawford, Library and Information History