The Society of Book Lovers in Lviv in the Years 1925–1939 in the Light of the Archival Materials of the Manuscript Department of Vasyl Stefanyk National Scientific Library of Ukraine in Lviv

During the interwar period in Poland, Lviv, as well as Krakow and Warsaw, was an important cultural and scientific center. The Lviv movement of book lovers was shaped by a group of people who passionately speaking, writing and discussing the subject of the book, organized readings, lectures, meetings, exhibitions and conventions, in many different ways promoted the love of owning books, as well as the enthusiasm for publishing and research. The book lovers’ societies that existed in those years also became book research laboratories and the founders of special publishing series. The aim of the paper is to trace the activities of the Book Lovers Society in Lviv in 1925–1939 based on archival materials of Manuscript Department of Vasyl Stefanyk National Scientific Library of Ukraine in Lviv. The majority of the documents located in the fund, including both official and interpersonal (members of the Management Board) incoming and outgoing correspondence of the Society, information on book awards nominations for active members of the Society, financial issues, including data on the payment of membership fees, book purchases, publishing matters, the Society’s property, bills receipts etc. All above represents the Society’s activities in the mentioned period including its achievements and problems with initiating, supporting and organizing cul­tural and educational activities with promoting reading and history, with par­ticular emphasis on the history of the city of Lviv. Keywords: Society of Book Lovers in Lviv, Statute of the Society, publishing series “Library of the Book Lovers Society in Lviv”, Miechyslav Opalek, Fran­tsishek Biesiadetski, III Congress of Polish Bibliophiles.