Chapter 28 empty bookshelf

When I came out of the main building of Humboldt University, I found the library diagonally across the road, so I thought I should check it out. On the side of the library next to the road, there is a small stone-paved square. I was about to cross it, but I saw a few pedestrians stop and look down at the ground, so I walked over.A few lines of writing were engraved on the underground stones, in German, so I took the liberty of asking a spectator nearby to translate them into English.It turns out that the inscription on the stone is: On May 10, 1933, a group of students driven by Nazi ideology burned a large number of works of writers, philosophers and scientists here.

The other half of the stone is engraved: burning books, which may be a precursor to people's self-destruction. Heine Just in front of this carved stone, a thick piece of glass is embedded on the ground. Looking down, there is a corner of the library underneath, and the four walls are full of empty bookshelves after burning. I don't know whether this is the real underground library or an image work designed by later generations to commemorate that event, but no matter which one it is, it is shocking to see.My heart was as empty as a bookshelf, and then it was tightened again.He looked carefully from four directions repeatedly, and then moved over to reread Heine's sentence.

A world-class university leaving such a scene in front of its door is a kind of imprint, a warning, and a frank statement: it is our own students who burn books, and all cultural damage behaviors have the name and identity of culture, so Passers-by in a hurry, don't trust this place too much!This is the conscience of the university. Burning books cannot help but think of China's Cultural Revolution.Empty bookshelves like that have appeared anywhere in China, and more recently than here for more than thirty years. I don't know why we can't remember, warn and confess like them.Before leaving this time, I lamented with some friends in China that the Cultural Revolution had only been over for more than 20 years, but the truth of it had been twisted and rewritten indiscriminately by some people in the same way as the Cultural Revolution.This is a dangerous signal because people have been hesitant to preserve the history of the disaster in a solid and transparent way.

For important history, any cover-up can only result in distortion.Disasters are a history, and the process of interpreting disasters is also a history, and the latter history can easily create new disasters.The only way to avoid this new disaster is to not cover it up, just like here, even if it happened in an underground library, a skylight must be opened to expose it to the broad daylight and present it naked to the eyes of future generations. It is conceivable that all students from various countries who have just been admitted to Humboldt University will come to visit the school library and find this inscription stone and this window before entering the door.They vaguely understood, stared at it for a while, then entered the library, looking up at today's bookshelf.Some of them may use this to study German history before and after World War II. Even if they don’t study it, most of them will be wary of all cultural crusades in today’s society.These behaviors are not necessarily burning books. Even the neo-Nazis in Germany no longer burn books. What needs to be vigilant is the destruction under the mask of fierce slogans, the violence under the mask of criticism, and the terror under the name of morality, which are often associated with students. The youthful vitality and the desire to fight are interdependent.

Therefore, this inscription stone, this window, can be regarded as the first teacher training of Humboldt University, the first school rule, which cannot be underestimated and irrefutable. In this way, this school exchanged a page of filth for all kinds of solemnity.