Libraries are the physical and institutional expression of a civilization's commitment to the continuity of knowledge — places where the accumulated understanding of the dead remains available to the living. The burning of the Library of Alexandria, the destruction of Mayan codices, the suppression of indigenous manuscripts: each represents not only the loss of texts but the deliberate severing of a civilization's access to its own intellectual heritage. In the digital age the library's function migrates without disappearing: the question of who curates, who preserves, and who has access to the accumulated knowledge of humanity remains as consequential as it has ever been.
Each step builds on the last.