林中小屋

Inside Asia’s oldest private library, guarding ancient scrolls in the age of AI_我的网站

一袋女王

一 |

Visitors view ancient documents at Tianyige Museum. Photo: Courtesy of Tianyige Museum
Huang Gang is in his fifties. Every day, he sits before a computer screen at Tianyige Museum (Tianyige), flipping through ancient books - digitally.
As director of the information technology department at Tianyige Museum in Ningbo, East China's Zhejiang Province, home to Asia's oldest surviving private library and one of the world's three oldest remaining family-run libraries, his job title may seem far removed from old books. Yet his work centers on them: converting brittle, thread-bound antique volumes into searchable, zoomable digital files accessible on screen.
For years, Tianyige has carried out digitization in batches guided by its mission: rescue-oriented preservation, scholarly organization and public-oriented outreach. Its teams have scanned more than 3.4 million pages of ancient texts. The institution rolled out its Ancient‑Book Digital Service Platform back in 2009. By 2025, the platform had drawn over 4.6 million total visits.
To outsiders, this might look like a headlong rush into digitization. For Huang and his colleagues, it is delicate work balanced between fast‑evolving artificial intelligence models and the reverence owed to fragile paper relics. "Technology is a tool, ancient books are artifacts, and reading is the ultimate purpose," Huang told the Global Times.
Huang Gang, director of the information technology department of Tianyige Museum, works on the digitization of ancient books. Photo: Courtesy of Tianyige Museum

Huang Gang, director of the information technology department of Tianyige Museum, works on the digitization of ancient books. Photo: Courtesy of Tianyige Museum
Beyond tech boundaries
Deep in the storage vaults of Tianyige, tens of thousands of ancient volumes rest in silence. Some pages are curled and fragile; others bear faded script -the accumulated marks of centuries. Vulnerable to aging, wear and external damage, these precious paper relics can hardly sustain long-term repeated manual consultation, making digital preservation an indispensable way to inherit ancient book resources.
Huang's daily work involves leading his team in the digitization of the library's entire collection of ancient books, paintings and cultural relics, bringing rare treasures out of the shadows and into public view.
AI now serves as a core auxiliary tool for ancient-book digitization and research. Huang's group initially built character-recognition frameworks based on optical-character-recognition technology. By cross-checking outputs across different models, ancient Chinese characters, damaged script and blurry handwriting.
According to Zhejiang Daily, by August 2025, the Tianyige's digital platform had added over 3,700 new digitized book sets, lifting its total digital holdings past 20,000 volumes.
Digitization is never a purely technical exercise; in-depth scholarly expertise in ancient texts remains indispensable. Huang frequently collaborates with Zhao Xuteng, a museum librarian specializing in classical literature. Zhao is responsible for selecting which volumes to digitize, evaluating editions, studying content, and identifying works of significant academic or public value. While one team focuses on the technical execution, another digs deep into the textual substance, ensuring that cold digital capture remains faithful to the historical and bibliographic logic of the originals.
A staff member of Tianyige Museum view digital resources of ancient documens in the museum's ancient?book reading room, on August 18, 2026. Photo: Lin Xiaoyi/GT

A staff member of Tianyige Museum view digital resources of ancient documens in the museum's ancient?book reading room, on August 18, 2026. Photo: Lin Xiaoyi/GT

A staff member of Tianyige Museum view digital resources of ancient documents in the museum's ancient book reading room, on August 18, 2026. Photo: Lin Xiaoyi/GT
Staying true to reading
When he is not writing code, Huang keeps asking one fundamental question: What should technology actually do for people? "All technology ultimately serves the act of reading itself," he said. "It can never replace that."
With the rapid rise of large language models, demand for high-quality text corpora has surged. Overseas, some AI companies have reportedly purchased millions of printed books in bulk, scanned them and then shredded the originals.
"Machines can efficiently compile documents, retrieve sources and generate explanatory notes. Real engagement with ancient texts, however, is far more than mechanical assembly of characters," Huang noted.
Both Huang and Zhao stressed that human beings sit at the heart of cultural inheritance. People absorb wisdom from old texts, draw on personal experience and scholarship to reflect, and produce new knowledge - an intellectual process no AI can fully replicate.
The Global Times learned that every digitization workflow at Tianyige follows strict closed-loop protocols: collection checkout logging, noncontact scanning, AI-powered quality checks, precise image stitching and compliant online publication. The full procedure minimizes physical wear on original artifacts.
"A book is, first and foremost, a cultural relic that carries a thousand-year legacy," Huang said. "Only secondarily is it a text to be read." That principle, he added, is shared by all guardians at Tianyige.
"Media change, technologies evolve, but the essence of reading has never changed," he stressed.
Today, drawing on its comprehensive digital collections, Tianyige hosts monthly exhibitions of rare texts and organizes family reading events where parents and children explore the classics together. For Huang and his colleagues, the most gratifying reward is watching more and more ordinary people develop a love for ancient reading and a deeper appreciation for the traditional Chinese culture.
In an era swept by artificial intelligence, Tianyige's guardians tend to fragile paper relics while leveraging modern technology, preserving the genuine power of reading. More than 450 years of scholarly heritage flows onward, passing between human fingertips and glowing digital screens.
。 8月26日讯联赛杯第2轮，诺丁汉森林主场0-2不敌利兹联遭到淘汰。森林开季英超和联赛杯连续主场面对利兹均输球，且一球未进。赛后，森林主帅格拉斯纳出席了发布会。球队在联赛杯出局了，你怎么评价这场比赛？没错，今晚格外艰难，这场失利让人难受。当然，开局的表现远不是我们想要的。但另一方面，这也是我们必须接受的，这就是现实，就是我们当下所处的处境。三天之内两次输给利兹联，我们就得承认，对手的状态确实比我们更好。他们这套班底已经磨合了两三年，还一直在陆续补充球员，我们能明显看到对方的稳定性要强得多。而我们今天不少时段踢得很吃力，失误太多了。我们明明清楚对手的逼抢节奏，却多次做出错误选择，正是这些失误送给对方机会，导致丢球。反过来，我们也有两三次不错的机会，但没能把握住。再说一遍，这就是现实。对我而言重要的是坦然接受，不去归咎其他人，否则情况不会有任何改观。能做出改变的只有我们自己，我们一定会做出调整。上周六赛后你就提到，犯错就会受到惩罚，而今晚球队的失误好像真的太多了没错，失误太多。而且有不少回合里，对手的冲击力和侵略性太强，这才导致我们接连出错。他们抓住其中一次机会取得领先。克里斯·伍德有一次极具威胁的攻门，被对方门将神奇扑出。之后还有一次长传转移，以及一个定位球机会，我觉得禁区中路那次对抗本该判犯规。

二 | 还有，传球的质量也不理想。但还是那句话，我不想去指责任何人，问题出在我们自身。今天的发挥，不足以拿下比赛。我们不能寄希望于对手发挥失常，踢得糟糕。

三 | 打出更好的表现、提升体能状态，这是我们自己的责任。有不少问题我们赛前就清楚，部分球员刚从长期伤病中复出。如果一些队员还没恢复到最佳体能，我们会针对性训练。但改变需要一点时间，不过我了解这支队伍，队员品性都很好，我们会刻苦训练、团结一心，慢慢取得进步。赛季才刚开打，虽说只踢了两场，对手也都是同一个，但两场主场失利、一球未进，你会不会对此感到担忧？我并不担心，但就像我说的，这样的结果不是我预想、也不是我们所有人想要的，可事实已经摆在眼前。

四 | 对比两场比赛来看，上一场我们几乎创造不出机会。而今天我们防线漏洞很大，给了对手不少机会，根源还是自身失误过多，这类问题必须减少，不然很难赢球。另外有一点也不是新鲜事，我不是要怪罪谁，只是客观事实——打进6个英超进球的头号射手吉布斯-怀特没能登场。我们要想办法创造更好的进攻位置，让更多球员进入危险区域，在禁区内把握机会的效率也要提升。我能看到，我们有时候缺少破门的冲劲，总想着用脚后跟这类花哨的方式处理球。

五 | 尤其是在英超赛场，两个禁区里的终结与防守都必须足够果断强硬，这一点我们急需改进。你刚才说利兹联阵容磨合成熟，教练和打法长期稳定，而你这边，按你的话说，球队还处在重建起步阶段。想必这需要耐心吧？是的，但我觉得问题从来不在于战术体系本身。后续要看新援的情况，我们也有可能调整体系。

六 | 我心态很开放，如果认定体系本身有问题，第二天就会改，所以体系不是症结所在。有时候我们用四后卫组织推进，可如果传球直接送到对方中场脚下，就会陷入被动。阵线压得太靠前、阵型层次拉不开，就会持续承受身后的压力，而这正是对手想要的局面。核心问题更多出在这些环节，而非战术框架。

七 | 就像你说的，我们才开启这个磨合过程，也看清了现阶段的差距。说实话，季前热身表现不错，我们原本以为状态会更好一些，但差距实实在在。

八 | 诺丁汉森林上赛季应该也体会过这种落差，欧战和英超的强度天差地别，今天这场比赛又一次印证了这点。我们必须适配英超的比赛节奏。我刚才也说了，全队会团结在一起，在训练场上刻苦打磨，这是唯一的破局办法，凭过往经验，只要坚持这么做，局面一定会好转。你提到转会窗关闭前还有变数，很多消息说德拉普可能加盟，有什么可以和我们透露的吗？没有更多消息，只要合同还没敲定，讨论就没有意义，变数太多。

九 | 不过周六赛后我说过，我有信心再引进两名球员，现在这份信心更强了。但还是那句话，新援到来不代表所有问题立刻迎刃而解。经历过去赛季的低谷之后，重建本就是漫长的过程，挫折在所难免。季前热身效果不错，如今我们遭遇了一次挫折，关键是怎么应对。一味归咎他人、归咎利兹联或是别的因素都毫无用处，改变不了现状。能扭转局面的只有我们自己。我在每一家执教的俱乐部都是这么做的。