Chapter 34 Section 8 Collection of Books in the Republic of China

The collection of books during the Republic of China can be roughly divided into four types: one is the thread-bound books left over from the Qing Dynasty and before the Qing Dynasty; the other is Chinese books published during the Republic of China; the third is domestically published and imported foreign language books; ,newspaper. How many ancient books are there in China?There was no statistics during the period of the Republic of China, but we can make a rough estimate based on evidence.The basis for this is: 1. The "Comprehensive Collection of Chinese Series Books" edited and published by the Shanghai Library in 1959 contained a total of 38,891 subheads; There are about 10,000 single editions; the third is based on the 7,413 ancient books on mountains, rivers and geography included in the "Comprehensive Records of Chinese Local Chronicles" edited by Zhu Shijia; It records a total of 55,908 kinds of rare books of ancient books collected by major libraries in mainland China, including classics, histories, subsections, collections, and series; the fifth is based on the engraved editions, manuscripts, and transcripts of ancient books bound in Beijing Library, which has the largest collection of ancient books in China. , There are about 300,000 kinds of rare books, of which there are about 200,000 kinds of different versions with the same content.Of course, the meanings of thread-bound editions and modern editions are different. As long as the age, location, color, font, binding, annotation, preface and postscript of the engraved editions are slightly different, they are regarded as different editions. This results in many books with different editions of the same content.Including the collection of ancient books in Hong Kong and Taiwan, it can be roughly said that there are no more than 80,000 to 90,000 kinds of ancient books in our country. Although this estimate is not very accurate, it has considerable basis.

How many Chinese paperback and hardcover books were published during the Republic of China period? There was no complete catalog of publications during the Republic of China period. Only the "Life National General Bibliography" published in November 1935 and edited by Ping Xin can be used for reference. "National Life Bibliography" contains 20,000 books published nationwide from 1911 to that time. The authors are collected from academic institutions, cultural organizations, major libraries, government agencies, research societies and private collections.This is also the most recorded record in the period of the Republic of China.

In addition, there are some other bibliographies. Among them, the "Summary of New Books Published Since the Republic of China" compiled by Yang Jialuo (published by Nanjing Dictionary in May 1936) contains more books. Books published since the beginning of the year, but only 8,553 titles have been collected. Compared with the "National General Bibliography of Life", there is a big gap in the number of books collected.From the perspective of publishing houses, the Commercial Press and Zhonghua Book Company during the Republic of China were the two largest publishing houses in the country.According to the "Commercial Press Book Catalog" (1897-1949) published by the Commercial Press in 1981, and recorded in the "Categorized Total of Publications of the Commercial Press Over the Years", the library published a total of 26,016 books from 1911 to June 1950.According to the "Zhonghua Book Company General Catalog" (1912-1949) published in 1987, the bureau published a total of 5,700 books during this period.

The most reliable is the "General Bibliography of the Republic of China Period" compiled by the Beijing Library from 1978 to 1992. This book is mainly based on the collections of the Beijing Library, Shanghai Library and Chongqing Library. Domestically published Chinese books are compiled into a general bibliography, which is divided into 18 categories and 20 sub-volumes, with a total of 124,040 titles included. During the period of the Republic of China, Shanghai was the center of national publishing. According to Xia Yan's recollection, "Shanghai was like 'half of the country' in terms of cultural publishing, but 'two-thirds of the world'".Secondly, there are many universities and scholars in Beijing, and the number of publications is second only to Shanghai.Chongqing was the accompanying capital during the Anti-Japanese War. The wartime publications first took Guilin as the hub, and then Chongqing as the center. The "General Bibliography" is mainly based on the collections of the northern map, the upper map and the heavy map. It seems that this estimate is similar.

How many Chinese periodicals and magazines were there in the period of the Republic of China? The “National Periodicals United Catalog (1833-1949)” compiled by the Beijing Library’s United Catalog Group in 1961 collected a total of 19,115 periodicals from 50 libraries across the country.After the book was published, it was found that there were still many periodicals that were not included, so a supplement was made in the 1980s, and 16,410 journals were included in the supplement. These were periodicals that were not included in the combined catalog in the past. At the end of the Qing Dynasty, there were about hundreds of species, and there were no more than a thousand species.Therefore, we can reasonably say that there were at least 34,000-35,000 Chinese periodicals published during the Republic of China period.At present, the units with the most periodical collections are Beijing Library, Shanghai Library and Peking University Library.

It is also difficult to find out the exact number of Chinese newspapers published in the territory of China during the Republic of China.According to the catalog of newspapers collected by the Beijing Library in 1981, a total of 1,813 Chinese newspapers during the Republic of China were published in China. This number should be regarded as a basis, which means that there were at least this many Chinese newspapers during the Republic of China, and the actual number may be more than this One number is more.Beijing Library, Shanghai Library, and Nanjing Library have the largest collection of newspapers in China.

As for the number of foreign language books and periodicals published domestically and imported from abroad during the Republic of China, there has never been a reliable figure. However, since the Beihai Library was merged into the Beiping Library in 1929, the collection of foreign language books in the Beiping Library is the largest among all libraries in the country. , So far, the Beijing Library has a total of 8,368,337 foreign language books and periodicals, ranking first in the country.Among them, there are 2,711,386 foreign language books and 5,656,951 bound volumes of foreign language periodicals.Since it is difficult to find a complete and accurate figure in China, I will not repeat it here.

As far as the whole country is concerned, before 1936, the library industry was in a stage of development and rise. According to statistics, there were 1,131 national libraries in 1929, 1,428 in 1930, 1,620 in 1931, and 1,620 in 1935. It was 2935, and it increased to a peak of 5196 in 1936 (see "Second Chinese Educational Yearbook").During the Anti-Japanese War, the library business was severely damaged. According to the statistics of the "Second China Education Yearbook", the number of libraries nationwide dropped to 831 in 1946.According to incomplete statistics, in 1948 the National Beiping Library had a total collection of 1.4 million books, and the National Central Library had a total collection of 940,000 books. In 1947, municipal libraries in 26 provinces nationwide collected 805,676 books.According to the "Second China Education Yearbook", in 1947, 115 libraries of public and private universities and colleges nationwide had a total collection of 6,236,220 volumes.At the same time, 60 private junior colleges across the country have a total of 616,380 books.