History Commons^™

The Louvain Library And U.S. Ambition In Interwar Belgium, Tammy M. Proctor

History Faculty Publications

This article analyzes the ordeal that became the ‘Louvain Library Controversy' in order to demonstrate competing visions of postwar memory and reconstruction that emerged in the 1920s. As a country trying to mediate between the claims of its larger neighbors (Germany, France, and Britain), Belgium provides an excellent window into the climate of postwar Europe and US intervention. I argue that the controversies that surrounded the Louvain Library reconstruction reflect three main themes that plagued European–US relations in the 1920s: first, US pretensions as Europe’s cultural protector; second, US economic power over debt and reparation questions; and last, the question …