History MissingEpisode / Literature

* The overwhelming majority of [[Creator/MarquisDeSade Marquis De Sade]]'s writings were burned shortly after his death by his own family, [[OldShame ashamed]] of his horrible crimes and unabashedly obscene literature. One of which was ''several volumes'' in length. A combination of psychiatric research, literary scholarship and pure BileFascination are responsible for preserving what remained of his work. For better or worse.

* The Literature/HoratioHornblower short stories "The Hand of Destiny", "Hornblower and His Majesty" and "The Bad Samaritan", originally published in ''Argosy'' in 1941, were discouraged from reprinting due to a ContinuitySnarl caused by ''The Happy Return'', ''The Hand of Destiny'' and ''Hornblower and the Atropos'' -- the taking of the Spanish ship ''Castilla'' and the powder burn on Hornblower's hand -- but were included in a (quite rare) biography of C. S. Forester. However, they've lately been compiled as "The Hornblower Addendum" for e-readers, so they're lost no longer. Also ''The Point and Edge'', which was unfinished when [[AuthorExistenceFailure C S Forester died]], and only exists as an outline in ''The Hornblower Companion'' and ''Hornblower During the Crisis''.

** ''Literature/TheBible'' contains references to books, such as the ''Book of Jasher'' and ''Chronicles of the Kings of Israel''. These are known as lost Jewish texts. Additionally, Books that were written in the New Testament era were either lost or destroyed (with some surviving and being recovered.) St Paul references The ''Book of Enoch'' in the New Testament Letters, but anyone looking for this in the Old Testament will be dissappointed.

* ''The Ghosts of Literature/FearStreet'': Look up a list of books, and you'll find that the 36th and final entry is called ''The Funhouse of Doctor Freek.'' Good luck finding a copy, though. The series' cancellation seems to have gotten it pulled before it was widely available in stores. [[https://www.lostmediawiki.com/The_Funhouse_of_Dr._Freek_(lost_Ghosts_of_Fear_Street_book;_existence_unconfirmed;_1998)#Possible_Proof_of_Funhouse.E2.80.99s_Existence You can occasionally find people online claiming to have read it]], but it's unclear if that's true.

** Andrews' only published short story from her lifetime, ''[[ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin I Slept With My Uncle On My Wedding Night]]'', was published only once in a pulp confessions magazine. She never told any of her family ''what'' magazine, so it remains unknown. In any case, it has yet to resurface, and no one (not even her estate) seems to have a copy of it.

* An example that's notable for being a missing book concerning a major film. In the final years of his life, ''Series/StarTrekDeepSpaceNine'' writer Michael Piller spent a significant amount of time writing ''Fade In: The Making of Film/StarTrekInsurrection'', a very comprehensive look at the behind-the-scenes process and development of what was the ninth feature film for the franchise. While the book is very thorough and engaging, it also highlighted several elements that contributed to the DorkAge the franchise found itself in during the early 2000's: lots of jockeying between members of the TNG cast (notably Brent Spiner) for increased screen time, the scuttling of several scripts that had the [[WhatCouldHaveBeen potential]] to be much, much better than the final product, and a detailed breakdown of Paramount's policies and correspondence regarding test screenings and film reshoots. The manuscript was left unreleased, apparently due to Paramount not agreeing with the content in the book, and it remained lost for many years until a source close to Piller passed it to some of the notable Trek fan sites. Almost immediately, the sites were all forced to remove the manuscript due to a cease-and-desist order from Piller's family, and it has once again fallen into obscurity (save for the few fans who downloaded a copy when it was still available).

* Creator/GeorgeZebrowski's "Literature/FoundationsConscience": The InUniverse conflict for the story comes from the [[TheAllConcealingI unidentified researcher]] trying to make an {{Anthology}} of [[PosthumousCharacter Hari Seldon's appearances in the Time Vault]]. However, they're initially prevented from doing so, because appearances two, three, and six are mislabeled. They eventually find the missing recordings, we see [[AllAccordingToPlan Seldon's final description of his Plan for the galaxy]].

* ''Literature/ForeverKnight'' produced three spin-off novels. A fourth, "On Holy Ground", was ready for release, but the license was cancelled. The fan-produced copies of the book that occasionally show up on Ebay can fetch a high price.

* An InUniverse example in Umberto Eco's ''Literature/TheNameOfTheRose'', which features a murder mystery whose solution hinges on the contents of Aristotle's lost second book of Poetics (dealing with comedy).
* An InUniverse example in ''Literature/TheDaVinciCode'', which builds its central theme around a fictional account of the apochryphal and partially lost Gnostic Gospels.

* ''The Ghosts of Literature/FearStreet'': Look up a list of books, and you'll find that the 36th and final entry is called ''The Funhouse of Doctor Freek.''Finding the book, however, has proven harder. The series' cancellation seems to have gotten it pulled before it was widely available in stores. [[https://www.lostmediawiki.com/The_Funhouse_of_Dr._Freek_(lost_Ghosts_of_Fear_Street_book;_existence_unconfirmed;_1998)#Possible_Proof_of_Funhouse.E2.80.99s_Existence You can occasionally find people online claiming to have read it]], but the veracity of these claims is uncertain.

** ''Literature/TheEpicOfGilgamesh'', which is considered the earliest surviving work of great literature (that is, a story that has an actual narrative to it), was originally lost for thousands of years. It wasn't until 1853 that the epic poem was rediscovered by Hormuzd Rassam, but It was only after World War I that the Gilgamesh epic reached a wide audience. But even then, since some portions of the story have been lost, some translations feature original material to fill the gaps, which occasionally works quite well. Most notably, at least one changes Gilgamesh's motivation from wanting immortality for himself to wanting to bring Enkidu back to life.

* "Cosmic Corkscrew", the first story Creator/IsaacAsimov submitted (unsuccessfully) for publication, no longer existed by the time Asimov's other early work was collected and published. TheOtherWiki has a whole [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Early_Asimov#Lost_stories list]] of early Asimov stories that were never published and so unable to appear in the anthology.

** ''Literature/TheBible'' contains references to books, such as the ''Book of Jasher'' and ''Chronicles of the Kings of Israel''. These are known as lost Jewish texts. Additionally, Books that were written in the New Testament era were either lost or destroyed (with some surviving and being recovered.)

* The Literature/HoratioHornblower short stories "The Hand of Destiny", "Hornblower and His Majesty" and "The Bad Samaritan", originally published in ''Argosy'' in 1941, were discouraged from reprinting due to a ContinuitySnarl caused by ''The Happy Return'', ''The Hand of Destiny'' and ''Hornblower and the Atropos'' -- the taking of the Spanish ship ''Castilla'' and the powder burn on Hornblower's hand -- but were included in a (quite rare) biography of C. S. Forester ([[http://www.scaryfangirl.com/Once%20Again5thNetVer.pdf found]] by [[MeaningfulName scaryfangirl.com]]). Also ''The Point and Edge'', which was unfinished when [[AuthorExistenceFailure C S Forester died]], and only exists as an outline in ''The Hornblower Companion'' and ''Hornblower During the Crisis''.

** ''Literature/TheIliad'' and ''Literature/TheOdyssey'' were originally just two of eight poems that made up the Literature/TrojanCycle telling the story of the Trojan War. The other six, which were not attributed to {{Homer}}, are all lost. However, it is possible to deduce the contents of the other poems through a number of summaries, excerpts and references in extant works.

* An InUniverse example in Umberto Eco's ''Literature/TheNameOfTheRose'', which features an a murder mystery whose solution hinges on the contents of Aristotle's lost second book of Poetics (dealing with comedy).

** ''Literature/TheEpicOfGilgamesh'', which is considered the earliest surviving story to have a real narrative, was originally lost for thousands of years. It wasn't until 1853 that the epic poem was rediscovered by Hormuzd Rassam, but It was only after World War I that the Gilgamesh epic reached a wide audience. But even then, since some portions of the story have been lost, some translations feature original material to fill the gaps, which occasionally works quite well. Most notably, at least one changes Gilgamesh's motivation from wanting immortality for himself to wanting to bring Enkidu back to life.

** ''Literature/TheEpicOfGilgamesh'', which is considered the earliest surviving story to have a real narrative, was originally lost for thousands of years. It wasn't until 1853 that the epic poem was rediscovered by Hormuzd Rassam. And even then, It was only after World War I that the Gilgamesh epic reached a wide audience.

* The never-published (but still canon) ''Franchise/{{Bionicle}}'' book, ''Invasion'', which was eventually lost forever after Greg Farshtey's computer died.

** ''Equilibrium'', a Third Doctor book. It was first pitched for the Missing Adventures line, and rejected because the line had all but ended and no further submissions were being taken. It was then shopped to the Past Doctor Adventures line that came up to replace it, only to be rejected because it used (the obscure but enjoyable) Great Vampires as the villains - the BBC had planned that the first Past Doctor Adventure (a Fifth Doctor story called ''Goth Opera'') would be released simultaneously with the second Eighth Doctor Adventure (''Vampire Science''), both forming a timey-wimey sequel/prequel {{Arc}} about Vampires, to serve as cross-promotion for both lines. ''Equilibrium'' contradicted the plot of this arc, and even if that had been fixable, releasing another Vampire book at that point would have caused confusion as to whether or not it was part of the arc, as well as villain-fatigue from the Vampires' overuse. ''Equilibrium'' was also eventually self-published as a fanzine.

* The memoirs of [[EvilMatriarch Agrippina the Younger]], which we only know existed due to their having been used as references by later Roman historians. Seeing the life of one of the most powerful and prominent women in Roman history from her own point of view would've been nice.
* Many ancient philosophical texts are considered lost. This includes all of Aristotle's dialogues (which themselves [[TropeMakers started a genre]] of texts distinct from Creator/{{Plato}}'s dialogues) and all the writings of the pre-Socratic philosophers. If Socrates himself ever wrote anything, that has vanished too. All that we know about any of these works, we owe to excerpts, summaries and other secondary sources written by later authors.