Mainz Publishing Archive offers insights into the workings of publishers focusing on paperback, encyclopedias, non-fiction, children’s books, and left-wing literature since the 1950s. The most important holdings come from publishing houses Rowohlt, Rotbuch, Europäische Verlagsanstalt, weissbooks.w, and Faksimile Verlag.

The archive can be used to research the influence of major publishing houses which have shaped the social and political reality of Germany since the second half of the 20th century. Hence, the stored documents are very diverse: Author-publisher correspondences, manuscripts, cover drafts, advertising materials, etc.

Students work with archival materials both in courses and for their theses, but researchers from Germany and abroad visit the archive, too.

The collection currently comprises about 15,000 specimen copies of publications (books and magazines, video and audio cassettes) and 10,500 archival units of documents.