“...to hinder the circulation of dangerous publications.” On closed library collections in the second half of the forties

BÁNFI Szilvia

Könyvtári Figyelő (Library Review) vol. 16 (52) 2006. no. 4. pp. 514–520.

In the Stalinist Soviet Union ideologically “dangerous“ works were weeded from public libraries thanks to the omni-present, well organised censorship; in research libraries these works were placed into closed collections with severe restrictions of use.
After 1945 the same practice was established in Hungary: a statutory order regulated the weeding and destruction of Fascist, Anti-Soviet or anti-democratic publications. This study shows the emergence of this approach by presenting the example of a book held by the National Széchényi Library (later transferred to the Closed Collection of the NL), and the relevant archival materials.