Visiting the restorer of ancient books: "Healing" ancient books with ingenuity to "resurrect" the memory of civilization in the fragments

　　BEIJING, August 7 Yinchuan electrical

　　China News Service reporter Yu Jing

　　Slow work leads to meticulous work, and the book also repairs the heart.

Ancient books are the bearer of culture and the testimony of time.

The ancient books have been preserved for thousands of years, and it is inevitable that they will be broken. The severely damaged ancient books are riddled with holes and the paper is scattered and can’t be read.

So, how can these broken ancient books continue to be preserved?

On August 7, the reporter walked into the Ningxia Library to explore the secrets of restoration of ancient books.

　　Today's "Zhuo" ancient book restorer is Yin Guanghua, who is nearly 60 years old, and her "patient" is the Qing Dynasty ancient book "Jin Si Lu".

　　Yin Guanghua told reporters that ancient books are books written or printed before 1912 in the form of Chinese classical binding.

"Paper has a thousand years of life, and silk has a longevity of eight hundred." Under the test of time, it is difficult for ancient books to remain intact. This requires an ancient book restorer to repair the damage.

Yin Guanghua is repairing ancient books.

Photo by Yu Jing

　　Yin Guanghua repaired "Jin Si Lu" while introducing the knowledge of ancient book restoration.

There was a book page on the table with the reverse side facing up. She moistened the page with a brush dipped in water, spread the damaged part with tweezers, and then dipped the brush with the paste, brushing the damaged edge stroke by stroke. Place.

When speaking, every action of his subordinates is very careful.

Afterwards, she took out the flattened pages of the book on the table, and did not notice the existence of the "patch" if she did not look carefully.

　　The dark yellow torn pages are traces of time.

Yin Guanghua can withstand loneliness, and with a pair of skillful hands and the ingenuity of restoration of ancient books, the ancient text and yellowed paper are once again displayed in front of the world.

　　"Book pages like this can be repaired in ten minutes, but it takes some time to make the paste in the early stage. The paste bought outside contains bleaching agents and preservatives." In order to prevent damage to the paper, all the pastes used for repairing It is hand-made by Yin Guanghua.

Yin Guanghua said that over the years, she has accumulated a lot of experience in the restoration of ancient books, and she can judge the problems in ancient books based on experience.

In addition, she will also take time to study ancient books and learn paper theory.

　　Sometimes, in order to repair a seriously incomplete ancient book, Yin Guanghua sits for a whole day, but this whole day can only repair one or two pages of ancient books.

Because of this, few people care about the ancient book restoration industry, but Yin Guanghua has persisted for 40 years.

　　"The ancient books have been preserved so far. "Injuries" such as moth-eaten, mildew, acidification, and disconnection are the norm. In the actual operation process, the restoration of ancient books should be repaired according to the principle of'repair the old as the old'." Yin Guanghua said, "repair the old. "As before" is simple to say, but the actual operation is more complicated and exquisite everywhere.

Every time he gets an ancient book, Yin Guanghua first checks and records the damage, and at the same time formulates a repair plan, and then cleans, arranges paper, repairs, hammers, trims, compacts, binds the ancient book according to the plan... before and after the whole process There are dozens of cumbersome processes.

"Dozens of procedures, each one is cautious, holding your breath." Yin Guanghua said with a smile, a sneeze, a deep breath, all efforts may be wiped out. Therefore, the restoration of ancient books cannot tolerate any mistakes.

　　Yin Guanghua said that it would take her several months to completely "recover" a severely damaged ancient book.

In more than 40 years, she has successively restored a number of precious ancient books including the 5.74-meter long scroll of Buddhist scriptures unearthed in 1991 at the two pagodas of the temple entrance of Helan Mountain and "Auspicious Everywhere to the Mouth and the Sutra".

Today, there are still a large number of ancient books "waiting" for her to rejuvenate.

　　"Some books will disappear if they are not repaired. I want to repair them as much as possible to make them live longer." She told reporters that there are about 50 million ancient books in the country, and at least one-third of them need to be repaired.

Yin Guanghua said: "In the future, I hope to use my own hands to repair more endangered ancient books, and then contribute to the sustainable use of the outstanding Chinese traditional civilization contained in these cultural treasures and the passing on from generation to generation." (End)