4.23 Reading Day
Today is book day
Let's take a look at the ancient book restorers
See how a pair of hands "turn decay into magic"
Precious ancient books that leave you devastated
Rejuvenate
Brushes, water, paste, brushes, tweezers... The tools are simple, the work is not simple.
Ran Yixu, an ancient book restorer who has just joined the Guizhou Provincial Library Ancient Book Conservation Center for more than a year, is restoring a huixian chronicle from the Republic of China period. Although the age of the book is not very long, the pages of the book have become yellow and brittle, and have reached the highest level of damage.
Ran Yixu: Before 1912, books with traditional Chinese binding forms were called ancient books. This acidification is a bit serious, according to the five-level grading, this book is already a first-degree acidification. Therefore, when making up, we should use wet repair, that is, when repairing, ensure that the page has a certain humidity, if it is dry, the page is easy to break when repairing.
Gently wet the pages of an ancient book
Gently drive away the bubbles inside with a brush
Ran Yixi's hands were like embroidery
Carefully maneuvered on the pages
The restoration of ancient books pays attention to the principle of "repairing the old as old", and every step of the process of restoration is very important to restore the original appearance of ancient books to the greatest extent.
A hundred years later, books will grow old. The speed at which a book "ages" depends on factors such as the material of the paper, the storage environment, and so on. And the destruction of our ancient books in Guizhou has a lot to do with the climate.
Huang Qin, director of the Ancient Books Protection Center of Guizhou Provincial Library: If the humidity is high, mildew and adhesion will occur during the book preservation process, which is especially suitable for the growth and reproduction of insects. Therefore, the types of damaged books in Guizhou are mainly based on insect moths, mildew, and adhesions.
The Guizhou Provincial Library has a collection of more than 200,000 volumes of ancient books and documents, and the ancient books and books such as "Bing Mirror" and "Eight Arrays of Combined Changes" are rare rare and orphan books in the country.
In order to better protect the ancient books and let the ancient books continue the context, three ancient book restorers were specially introduced last year: Ran Yixu, Zeng Qilin, and Li Mingyan.
Zeng Qilin was repairing a set of "Guiyang FuZhi" from the Daoguang years, a total of forty volumes, and the damage of the book being repaired was probably at the fourth level, which was slight. It can only be repaired for four or five pages a day, and it takes a long time to repair it.
Shu shu is even more cultivative
Open ancient books
Look at the paper chosen by the ancients
Condensed with the wisdom of the ancients
There is more to the words than just the author's thoughts
There is also the inheritance of the context
Dawn Rock said that as a restorer, they can see some other latitude things, such as through the paper in this book, they can understand the papermaking process at that time.
Guizhou Provincial Library Ancient Books Protection Center
Huang Qin, director of the Guizhou Provincial Library Ancient Books Protection Center, said that in the last century, they were mainly in the form of teachers and apprentices, oral transmission, traditional techniques are completely handmade, and now with the progress of the times and the development of science and technology, there are also many new technologies and new facilities and equipment. At present, many colleges and universities have opened a major in cultural relics restoration, and also provided a large number of professionals for the restoration of ancient books. In 2008, the Guizhou Provincial Library Ancient Books Protection Center became the first batch of "National Ancient Books Key Protection Units".
So far, according to the statistics of the number of pages of ancient books restored, the Guizhou Provincial Library Ancient Book Protection Center has repaired tens of thousands of pages, so that many ancient books have returned to the hands of readers again. Books are one of the greatest inventions of mankind and a symbol of human civilization. The restoration of each ancient book is an important project to excavate the historical value of China's excellent traditional culture and cultivate cultural self-confidence.
Reporter: Liang Chuanming