The complete works of the poet Gallus (who was mentioned by Ovid in the same breath as Homer and Virgil); 245 comedies by the Greek playwright Alexis; 20 volumes of Etruscan history compiled by the Emperor Claudius; The Book of Music by Confucius; over 60 theological disquisitions by the Venerable Bede; Molière’s translation of Lucretius; Byron’s memoirs; the second part of Dead Souls; Literature and Export Trade, by T. S. Eliot; the French novelist Georges Perec’s inventory of everything he ate in the course of a year… Those are just a few of the books under which our shelves don’t groan. They are among the casualties Stuart Kelly casts his eye over in his survey of works by famous authors which have disappeared.

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