The National Library of China in Prospect

The National Library of China (NLC) is both the national repository for publications of China as well as a comprehensive research library. It provides services to the central government, to key research, educational, and production institutions, and to the general public. NLC is also responsible for carrying out cultural agreements with foreign countries on behalf of the Chinese government and promoting exchange and cooperation with libraries worldwide. The strategic plan for the next five years for the NLC focuses on three areas: (1) developing an innovative infrastructure to support excellent services related to traditional materials, (2) further strengthening modern information services, and (3) establishing new service areas through staff training and continuing education. The NLC priorities in the next five years include the following: 1. Complete the NLC Phase II Project and National Digital Library Project to achieve balanced collections and improved service structures leading to overall enhanced delivery of comprehensive knowledge services. 2. Implement creative methods to provide new services and improve service quality, and adopt new models to meet the information needs of governmental bodies, educational institutions, commerce and industry, and the general public. 3. Strengthen the collection and preservation of documents and information so as to build a high quality national repository of multimedia and multilingual content. 4. Establish a comprehensive and multidimensional exchange and cooperation system focused on China and globally responsive that follows the principle of “open construction, mutual benefit, collaboration in development and sharing.” Origin and Development of the National Library of China The origins of the National Library of China (NLC) can be traced to the Capital Library that was founded on September 9, 1909. The Capital Library opened to the public in August 1912 and officially started to receive deposit copies of Chinese publications in 1916. In July 1928, the Capital Library was renamed National Beiping Library. After the founding of the People’s Republic of China, the National Beiping Library was renamed Beijing Library. On December 12, 1998, the name of the Beijing Library was changed to the National Library of China. * This talk was originally delivered at the annual meeting of the Committee on Chinese Materials of the Council on East Asian Libraries in San Francisco, California, on April 6, 2006. Journal of East Asian Libraries, No. 139, June 2006 2 The NLC’s collections include items in foreign languages and many rare books. Presently, the library holds 270,000 volumes of rare books, 1.64 million of general ancient books, and 35,000 pieces of oracle bones of the Shang Dynasty (c.16-11 century B.C.). NLC is well known for its collections of ancient rare books. The earliest book collection in NLC is that of the Royal Jixidian of the Southern Song Dynasty (1127-1279 AD), which dates back seven hundred years. Rare books in foreign languages include incunabula printed in Europe between 1473 and 1477. NLC also has numerous special collections, including manuscripts of notable authors, historical documents of the Chinese revolution, local gazetteers, genealogies, Chinese doctoral dissertations, and publications of the United Nations and other international organizations. After years of unremitting effort, NLC has in place a structure that emphasizes both collection and access in all facets of collecting, processing, storing, supplying, and developing document and information resources.