Excavation site of Erlitou Culture in the west of Henan Province

 

Recently, Shandong University has initiated the Project on Global Collection and Compilation of Ancient Chinese Books in an effort to integrate, publish and digitize Chinese classics worldwide through international cooperation. The project comes at a time when research institutes studying overseas Chinese classics are springing up one after another in China, and it is of great significance to research in this field and to Chinese studies.

Academic significance
Owing to a better academic environment in recent years, scholars in China are expanding their perspectives and beginning to pay attention to Chinese documents treasured in other countries around the world and the neighboring countries in particular.

The worldwide existence of overseas Chinese classics mirrors the process of Chinese culture spreading abroad as well as its assimilation and transformation in other countries in line with local needs, said Sun Xiao, a research fellow from the Institute of History at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) who is a pioneer in the study of overseas Chinese classics and has made remarkable achievements in this field. “That is why we put forward the concept of the Chinese Classics Road,” he added.

Rough estimates show that there are about 270,000 Chinese classics in existence around the world, among which more than 163,000 are preserved on the Chinese mainland, about 37,000 in Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan and more than 60,000 elsewhere, said Zheng Jiewen, director of the Research Center of Chinese Classical Documentology, Shandong University.
 

“The integration project can provide systematic research material to the circle of Chinese studies, maintain the completeness of Chinese culture and further promote the development of Chinese studies,” Zheng said.

Overseas Chinese documents have presented a new topic for the academic circle as well as new academic methods and concepts and may give rise to a new discipline, said Zhang Bowei, a professor of the School of Liberal Arts, Nanjing University.

Return of Chinese classics
The call to gather overseas Chinese documents is growing louder. Scholars have made many attempts to republish overseas Chinese works at home. The nation has also lent great support to such an effort. The key project of publishing the Rare Overseas Chinese Book Library, chaired by the Institute of History under CASS, has been included into the 11th Five-Year Plan (2006-2010) and listed in the Outline of the National Program for Cultural Development.
 

Sun said the Library is being compiled based on five classifications: Confucian classics, writings on history, geography and ancient institutions, works about the hundred schools of thought, Buddhism and Taoism, collections of proses, poems or verses, and books in series. It is projected to publish 800 volumes that will include nearly 3,000 overseas Chinese works hardly seen in libraries at home. At present, 619 volumes have been published and the entire program will be completed in August this year.
 

In addition, research institutes of overseas Chinese classics vary in research fields and features. The Institute of History under CASS focuses on the collation of historical material. The research team of Nanjing University lays stress on literary documents and has probed deeply into the Chinese literary works in Korea. Some other scholars pay attention to the study of cultural exchanges in ancient times.

Setup of database
Zheng Jiewen said that the Project on Global Collection and Compilation of Ancient Chinese Books will accomplish the Compilation of Global Chinese Classics, including the compilation of the Union Catalog of Global Chinese Classics as well as the selection and replication of rare books using modern technology. Upon completion, the digital Compilation of Global Chinese Classics will be six times the size of the Siku Quanshu (Complete Library in Four Sections) in the Qing Dynasty, the largest collection of books in Chinese history, and be photocopied in batches.
 

The project of publishing the Rare Overseas Chinese Book Library is drawing to a close.

“In addition to the Rare Overseas Chinese Book Library, most other overseas Chinese works will also be transformed into electronic versions for readers,” Sun said. “Once completed, the Digital Library of Overseas Chinese Classics together with the Database of Chinese Classic Ancient Books will become the two largest databases of ancient Chinese  books.”
 

The research team led by Zheng Jiewen has been busy visiting libraries with collections of Chinese documents all over the world. Zheng said that the researchers of the Compilation of Global Chinese Classics have already learned about the collection of Chinese works across the world. When selecting books for publication, they pay attention to the academic value of each work as well as look at the experience from the existing editions.
 

However, there have been some challenges in the process. Zheng said unified planning and coordination is needed in the integration and research of international Chinese classics in order to bring about centralized and lasting efforts in this field.