In his acclaimed Double Fold
(2001), Nicholson Baker expressed outrage over newspapers and books turned into landfill by librarians who chose microfilm over paper. French historian Polastron picks up where Baker left off, writing with equal passion yet punctuating his pages with wit. A specialist in Chinese and Arab studies, Polastron surveys the annihilation of libraries from ancient Mesopotamia and China to potential problems looming with the cyber contents of today’s “virtual books.”Although Polastron learned of lost libraries while writing a history of paper, it was the 1992 destruction of the National Library in Sarajevo that triggered his desire to explore “all nooks and crannies of history in the attic of every civilization.”Over the millennia, libraries crumbled to rubble during wars and bombings; theft and storage problems account for more losses. As countless books went up in smoke, others sank to a watery grave during shipwrecks and floods. Lamenting the loss of the ancient Alexandria library, the author covers books that perished during the Inquisition, the French Revolution and in Nazi Germany. Polastron’s exhaustive research and vast scope make this detailed, authoritative study a revelatory read. (Oct. 26)
