For more than half a century, the United States’ vast literary culture has been disparately policed, and imperceptibly contained, by state and corporate entities well placed and perfectly equipped to wipe out wayward writings. As US does not ban books, other means—less obvious, and so less controversial—have been deployed to vaporize them.

The purpose of Forbidden Bookshelf is to bring such disappeared books back to life so that readers may finally learn what those in power did not want anyone to know. Curator and NYU professor Mark Crispin Miller speaks about the Forbidden Bookshelf series in this new podcast. Sign up for his free daily e-newsletter, News From Underground, here.