Just off Berlin’s Unter den Linden avenue and opposite Humboldt University is one of the most poignant memorials of the 20th century: the Empty Library by Micha Ullman. It commemorates the events of 10 May 1933, when students from the National Socialist Students’ Union, supported by professors from Friedrich Wilhelm University (today’s Humboldt University), under the musical accompaniment of SA and SS troops, burned more than 20,000 books by Jewish, left-wing, liberal and socially critical authors. The ceremony took place in the presence of a crowd gathered at the former University Library and the then Kaiser-Franz-Josef-Platz, today’s Bebelplatz.
Historical background and concept
As early as 6 April 1933, the German Students’ Union announced a nationwide action “against the un-German spirit”, which was to culminate in a purification of literature by fire (Säuberung). Local branches prepared black lists of banned books, including Jewish, Marxist, socialist, feminist and deemed anti-German works. In Berlin, on the rainy evening of 10 May, 40,000 people gathered at Opernplatz (today’s Bebelplatz) to watch 5,000 students march with flaming torches to set fire to a pile of confiscated books. Also present was Joseph Goebbels, propaganda minister of the Third Reich, who gave a fiery (nomen omen) speech declaring the end of “exaggerated Jewish intellectualism” and symbolically “entrusting to the flames the intellectual dross of the past”. In May 1933, similar events took place in 34 other German cities.
The Empty Library – design and implementation
In 1993, on the occasion of the 60th anniversary of the book burning at Bebelplatz, the Berlin Senate announced a competition for the design of the monument. The winning proposal was by the Israeli artist Micha Ullman, known for his works dealing with the themes of absence and memory. His design called for the excavation of an empty space beneath the square – a physical and symbolic ‘memory hole’. The monument was unveiled on 20 May 1995. The room measures 530 × 706 × 706 cm and sits under a glass slab in the paving of the square. Inside are empty white bookcases that would hold exactly the number of books that were burned in 1933. The work is an example of the so-called negative form, an artistic motif of emptiness that forces the viewer to lean into the space beneath their feet. The interior is air-conditioned, constantly illuminated and protected by a glass panel that has to be replaced every few months due to scratches.
The Empty Library and its symbolism
The monument is located exactly where books used to burn, between the former library and the main university building. A few metres away from the main installation, a plaque with a quote by Heinrich Heine from the drama Almansor (1820) is embedded in the cobblestones:
“Das war ein Vorspiel nur,
dort wo man Bücher verbrennt,
verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen.”
which means:
“It was only an introduction,
where books are burned,
people are burned at the end.”
These words, spoken more than a century before the Holocaust, take on a frightening topicality at this point. Especially since Heine’s own books were on Hitler’s blacklists. Today, the Empty Library commemorates the tragic events of the past. It is also a space for reflection on the role of memory and freedom of expression. Its silence speaks more than a thousand words.
Source: visitberlin.de
Read also: History | Berlin | Germany | Interesting facts | Monument
