Western language collection worth 120m yuan a boost for pre-eminent China university
Harvard University's Hilles Library is donating 150,000 reference books worth more than 120 million yuan to Zhongshan (Sun Yat-sen) University in Guangzhou to boost its Western languages collection in social sciences and humanities.
Last Sunday, Nancy Cline, the Roy E. Larsen librarian of Harvard College, and Professor Cheng Huan-wen, director of Zhongshan University Library, signed a formal agreement to transfer a significant selection of Harvard's Hilles Library collection to Sun Yat-sen University next summer.
Collected over a century, the works are primarily in English but also include other Western languages. The books in 12,000 different categories cover subjects in arts, politics, sociology, women's studies and music.
The books will be kept in Zhongshan University's east campus in Guangzhou University City in Panyu District.
The donation is the result of a decision this year to reconfigure Hilles from a full-service operation to a small reading library as its holdings closely replicate those of Lamont Library, the university's primary undergraduate library.
The Harvard College Library will retain unique titles and disperse valuable duplicates in the collection to other libraries throughout the university; 28,000 volumes will stay in Hilles, and the remaining 158,000 volumes will go intact to Zhongshan University Library.