Of Books and Men
Possibilities and Limits in the Dispute over Looted Art
Deutsche Fassung
Abstract
The director of the Moscow Library for Foreign-Language Literature, Ekaterina Genieva, sees opportunities for emerging from the shadow of the Second World War, demonstrates by means of her library what is doable despite imperfect laws, reminds us that courage and freedom go hand in hand, reveals that it is sometimes better not to ask ministers, expresses sympathy for the women from Tomsk, who, having returned certain books, now have to make do without majuscules, gets angry about the thick layers of hypocrisy in the restitution debate and stresses that the alpha and omega of dealing with unlawfully transferred objects of art is free access, use, information and international cooperation.
(Osteuropa 1-2/2006, pp. 193–204)