“To be intellectually curious is to be alive,” reflects the late Umberto Eco in a new film about his prolific literary career. “And believe me, a lot of people are not alive.” An esteemed academic semiotician by trade, Eco was also a preeminent medievalist, critic, journalist, and, of course, fiction writer—The Name of the Rose (1980) remains one of the best-selling novels in history. The breadth of his cognitive capacity knew no bounds. Davide Ferrario’s documentary A Library of the World (2022) sheds light on the basis of Eco’s knowledge: he was a prolific reader and book collector. The film explores his collection of 50,000 volumes, and, compellingly, “the library of his mind.” —Jack Sullivan