The Writer's Library as a Response to Nazi Ideology During the Second World War

In the Fantasia of the Library, Michel Foucault posits that the library represents a place where knowledge and dreams converge. In this context, it seems appropriate to conceptualise the writer’s library as a “network”, specifically an “open network”, which is subject to constant transformation and linked to other libraries. The present study will focus on two Belgian writers: Paul Willems (1912–1997) and Max Servais (1904–1990). It will examine the extent to which the imaginary library constructed through reading, quotations or pictorial references creates this other space of non-resignation in the specific historical context of the Second World War. This reflection is an attempt to introduce another hermeneutic level that sets up the library as a response to Nazi ideology.