Berlin - The flames shot into the night sky when university students in Berlin and other German cities tossed thousands of books onto bonfires to purge Nazi Germany of un-German ideas.

The ceremonial burning of books written by Jews, communists and "degenerates" on May 10, 1933 took place less than four months after Adolf Hitler came to power.

This week, the country is hosting a series of lectures, exhibitions, discussions and readings to mark the 75th anniversary of the unsavoury event.

The Academy of Arts in Berlin is holding a commemoration ceremony on Friday during which German President Horst Koehler will be the keynote speaker.

Actors, authors and schoolchildren will read from the works of some of the around 130 authors whose works went up in flames, among them Bertolt Brecht, Sigmund Freund and Thomas Mann.

On Saturday, Berlin's renowned Humboldt Library and the Spanish Cultural Institute, Cervantes, are jointly hosting readings and recitals from the burned works.

The event takes place on the same square where some 40,000 Nazi supporters gathered three-quarters-of-a-century ago to witness the book burning in the German capital.

Today an underground memorial marks the spot on what is now August Bebel Platz. Conceived as an "empty library" visitors can view it through a glass window built into the pavement.

"It is the right monument in the right place," according to Klaus Staeke, president of the Academy of Arts.

Records show that at least 35,000 books were burned in 22 cities between May and the end of August 1933 in an event unseen since the Middle Ages.
In Berlin, Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels delivered a midnight speech in which he said: "The era of Jewish intellectualism is now at an end. The soul of the German people can express itself again."

The students, who were at the vanguard of the Nazi movement, compiled blacklists of undesirable authors and circulated them to public and private libraries.

In addition to German-speaking authors, works of American writers Jack London, Ernest Hemingway and Helen Keller were also consigned to the flames.

While the names and works of many of the targeted authors are still popular today, others like German writers Maria Leitner and Georg Hermann have virtually been forgotten.

This shows that in some ways the book burning had a long-term effect, according to Olaf Zimmermann, managing director of the German Council of Culture.

"Yes, it's disgraceful, but the sad fact is that many authors whose books landed on the bonfires have faded into obscurity," he said.

Passages from some of their works will be read out at the weekend events, he said.

The book burning was the last major orchestrated event in the early stages of Hitler's rule, following a purge of communists and trade unions and a Nazi-organized boycott of Jewish goods.

It was also marked the start of censorship and the introduction of Propaganda Ministry "guidelines" to which all aspiring writers were expected to adhere.

Within the space of days the German book trade published a list of 131 authors and ordered libraries and bookshops to cleanse their shelves of their works. Many of the writers had already fled the country. (dpa)