The University's Source of

Knowledge about China

Six Centuries of Books

HOWARD P. LINTON
 

NE of the most gratifying things about the Columbia
University Libraries these days, at least to those of us in
the East Asiatic Library, is the current spotlight on the
Far East. The "Polo to Perry" exhibit in Butler Library, and Pro¬
fessor L. Carrington Goodrich's article elsewhere in this issue,
present a logical opportunity to discuss further the facilities for
research into Ciiinese studies that are a\'ailable at Columbia.

The days when a library's maintenance of Chinese books was
considered an exotic indulgence have largely passed. It is still de¬
sirable, nevertheless, to take e\'ery opportunity to promote a
fuller recognition of the tremendous storehouses of knowledge
that exist in Chinese printed literature. That literature is indis¬
pensable for all studies of world history and culture, just as it is
for finding workable solutions to some of the key issues of the
world today. Chinese studies are on the increase: sound, scholarly
studies, as well as popular ones which now find a publishing market
because of the continued presence of the Far East in the news¬
paper headlines. There remains, even so, an enormous number of
primary and secondary sources that should be explored, of topics
that should be developed from them. Columbia's Chinese collec¬
tion, especially strong—and in some cases unique—in the fields of
the humanities and the social sciences, is admirably equipped to
supply the facilities for such research.

Columbia's first recorded Chinese book, in the form of a trans-

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