... a deeply engaging and timely 'history of knowledge under attack'... detailing specific episodes rather than attempting a comprehensive history, charting the apparently never-ending threat to the recorded past. He dissects the methods and motives of those who have sought to burn, bury or delete the texts through which the story of the human race – its wanderings, discoveries and longings – has been documented. But he is careful to lavish special attention, the admiration of a kindred spirit, on those who stood in the way.

... Burning the Books reveals on every page, not only is he careful, diligent and wise, he also knows what to leave out, and what to keep in – and it’s this quality, above all, that makes his book so remarkable. Its sweep is quite astonishing and yet, amazingly, his narrative runs to just 320 pages.

... eminently readable.

... an erudite, frightening and often exhilarating journey, from the partial destruction of the huge library of the Assyrian King Ashurbanipal at Nineveh in 612 BC to the current threat to human knowledge posed by our reliance on powerful private interests who control our digital resources.

... a passionate and illuminating account of the obliteration of knowledge that has occurred over the past three millennia. Ovenden’s aim is 'not just to highlight the destruction of [libraries] . . . but also to acknowledge and celebrate the ways librarians and archivists have fought back'. Working in a library is usually a rather safe profession, but the characters in this book are superheroes who fight and die for the cultures they are obliged to protect.

In Burning the Books: A History of the Deliberate Destruction of Knowledge , Richard Ovenden, head librarian at the University of Oxford’s Bodleian Library, chronicles how libraries have served as sanctuaries for knowledge under constant threat, and what that means for the present and the future.

... a thoughtful and readable addition to the oeuvre.

... a wide-ranging and thought-provoking account of efforts to destroy, neglect, or conceal books, archives, private papers, government documents, and other records.