Under the direction of the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of the People’s Republic of China, China-CEEC Libraries Union was established in October 2018 in Hangzhou, China, with its secretariat permanently set in Hangzhou Public Library. More than 60 libraries from China and CEEC, on a voluntary basis, seek common progress made on the principle of "equality, mutual benefit, inclusiveness and openness". 

The Very Collection in My Library aims to introduce treasures kept in each member library to audience in China and Central and Eastern European countries and bring ancient books into the limelight, through of which people could enhance their understanding of cultures and histories of other countries.

This episode here is presented by Jiao Xiang, the director of Jinling Library, introducing you the rare ancient book Hundred Poems and Forty-Eight Sceneries of Jinling.

Hundred Poems and Forty-Eight Sceneries of Jinling was written by Tang Lian in the Qing Dynasty of China and was engraved in the Reign of Emperor Guangxu of the Qing Dynasty. This book is a bound edition of two works of literatures: Hundred Poems of Jinling and Forty-Eight Sceneries of Jinling. 

Tang Lian, born in Tangshan, Jiangning District, Nanjing City, lived in the late Qing Dynasty. He called himself a “rotten fairy” and “the man who loved landscapes”. He wrote a lot all his life, which was later collected into Tang's Series. It included 26 kinds of poems, essays, words and couplets, in a total of 42 volumes. Among them, Hundred Poems of Jinling mentioned many new scenic spots at that time, such as the Tomb of Prince Zhongshan of Ming Dynasty, Yuejiang Tower, Horo Temple, TieGong Temple and so on. In the preface to Forty-Eight Sceneries of Jinling, it was said that “Tang Lian was very talented in writing poetry, and was comparable to Su Shi, Huang Tingjian, Li Bai and Du Fu. “These poems express emotions through the scenery and make people think a lot.

From the forty-eight sceneries of ancient Jinling to the forty-eight sceneries of Modern Jinling, the current Nanjing is full of vitality again.