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FOREWORD II

DR. HWA-WEI LEE is widely recognized as a highly accomplished, world-class library professional and administrator, as showcased in the simultaneous publication of two books: Yang Yang’s, The Sage in the Cathedral of Books: The Distinguished Chinese American Library Professional Dr. Hwa-Wei Lee, and Collected Works of Dr. Hwa-Wei Lee. To an entire generation of library professionals, however, Dr. Lee is more than that: He is an ambassador of international librarianship, the first overseas library professional to come to China at the initial stage of the Chinese economic reform and open-door policy. It was Dr. Lee who held our hands and led us to the outside world.

Back in the early 1980s, I was a librarian at Peking University Library, and, like my peers, young junior scholars, hungered for the outside world beyond China. Dr. Lee’s visit brought us a vivid depiction and expert interpretation of the libraries and librarianship on the other side of the Pacific Ocean, which were far richer than what we could perceive from just reading documents and reports by foreigners. Dr. Lee was always tireless and scrupulous and never seemed to look down on those of us who frequently threw brusque and ignorant inquiries of all kinds at him. He never forgot to say a few encouraging words to us after having addressed our, often, dumb questions.

Shortly thereafter, quite a few young librarians from Peking University Libraries were sent one after another to participate in the International Librarians Exchange Program at Ohio University, an exchange created and developed under Dr. Lee’s administration as the dean of Libraries. I was originally on that exchange list but was later reassigned to an unsuccessful international exchange program with Australia. I have been bothered by the loss of that training opportunity at Ohio University, especially after I learned that the multi-year program, which continued from 1979 to 1999, had welcomed more than 150 librarians from mainland China from 1983 to 1999, with each participant receiving a half-year to one full year of training. Many of those librarians later became the elite in Chinese librarianship and made great contributions to the advancement of the field.

Dr. Lee’s influence has been felt across all the institutions where I have worked—from Peking University, to the Library Department of the Ministry of Culture, to Shenzhen Library. He has never stopped building the connection between Chinese librarianship and American/international librarianship.

Dr. Lee is renowned as an academic ambassador of international librarianship among the Chinese library community to which he devoted many years of tireless effort. In addition to his library consultant title at Shenzhen Library (one he served during my term there), he has been invited to serve as a guest faculty member, visiting professor, and academic adviser by at least twenty institutions of higher education and research libraries including: Peking University, Tsinghua University, Zhejiang University, Beijing Normal University, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunication, Xian Jiaotong University, Nankai University, Hunan Medical University, Wuhan University, Sichuan University, Northeast Normal University, Tianjin Polytechnic, National Library of China, Zhejiang Provincial Library, the central and branch (Lanzhou and Wuhan) libraries of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the National Central Library of Taiwan.

In addition, Dr. Lee was honored as a lifetime member of the Library Society of China at its 2005 annual conference. All these real and honorary titles highlight his remarkable achievements over the years.

This biography by Yang Yang shows a clear picture of an engaged and accomplished professional in the Chinese librarianship field. Dr. Lee has made at least one trip, “returning home,” each year since 1982 to give lectures or attend conferences in China, making him much closer and more approachable to us. In addition, he has organized or contributed to a countless number of scholarly activities, which have exerted a tremendous impact on governmental and nongovernmental entities. It is hard to imagine that Dr. Lee accomplished all this during his busy administrative career at Ohio University Libraries and the Library of Congress. Dr. Lee’s “returning home” trips have never stopped, even after his retirement from LC in 2008. He is still traveling between China and the U.S., making his tireless contribution to the “China-U.S. Librarians Professional Exchange Project,” of which Dr. Lee was one of the initiators. Thousands of Chinese library professionals have benefited from the project.

The most precise and descriptive acclaim that Chinese people use to applaud Dr. Lee’s accomplishment is “a hub connecting the East and the West and a bridge [connecting] China and the United States.”

As the director of Shenzhen Library, I personally experienced evidence supporting how well-deserving Dr. Lee is of that acclaim. In the 1980s, a librarian exchange program was established between Ohio University and Shenzhen Library. Under this program, dozens of library professionals from Shenzhen Library went to Dr. Lee’s library for an internship, training, or a visit. These elite library professionals, who gained a global vision at Dr. Lee’s library, have made a significant contribution toward developing the Integrated Library Automation System (ILAS) and the 24/7 Self-Service Library, the two most advanced and influential library services from Shenzhen Library. It is hard to imagine that the field of Chinese librarianship could have become as successful as it is today without Dr. Lee’s persistent and consistent effort. What great accomplishments and contributions Dr. Lee has made to us!

Zhongyan Fan (989–1052 AD), a prominent politician and literati of the Northern Song Dynasty China, wrote a song: “The distant mountain covered by cloud and the magnificent river flowing past—it resembles your majestic character which will last forever just as the high mountain and long river.” This song could be a perfect portrayal of Dr. Lee’s sincere heart and gentle spirit. On his eightieth birthday, I sincerely wish Dr. Lee a very happy and healthy life with continued guidance and support for a brighter future of Chinese librarianship.

Xi Wu

Director, Shenzhen Library

Shenzhen, China

September 2011