Tirana Times
TIRANA, Jan. 25 – The National Library in Tirana closed this week celebrations on its 90th anniversary of foundation with the promotion of two special publications tracing the history of Albanian books from the early 16th century authors to the end of World War II. In a ceremony held on Monday evening, Jan. 24, in the library premises, organizers promoted two separate publications, the “Book in Albanian (1555-1912) in the collection of the National Library,” and “Bibliography of Books in Albanian in the collection of the National Library (1913-1944).”
Addressing participants, the library’s director Aurel Plasari described the promotion of the books as the culmination of events celebrating the library’s 90th birthday. Thanking the authors and the generations of bibliographers, Plasari said the new books were works which had been missing in Albanian culture.
Prime Minister Sali Berisha, who was also present at the promotion ceremony, said the new books were an encyclopedia of Albanian thinking and a fundamental document of Albania’s ingenious creativity.
A book exhibition dedicated to Naim Frasheri, Albania’s greatest Renaissance author, nowadays considered a national poet, was held as part of the event, featuring his publications from 1882 to 1912 in Istanbul, Bucharest, Sofia, Thessaloniki and the southeastern Albanian city of Korca.
Founded on July 10, 1920, the National Library initially had only 6,000 volumes mainly from the collection of the Albanian Literary Commission (Komisija Letrare Shqype), set up in cooperation with the Austro-Hungarians in 1917 to decide on questions of orthography for official use and to encourage the publication of Albanian school texts.
The end of the World War II found the National Library with a collection of 15,000 volumes. The library moved to its current premises at the Palace of Culture only in 1966.
The collapse of the 45-year communist regime in the early 90s brought crucial changes in the functioning of the National Library which removed barriers to subscribers and enriched its collection with books which were not deemed appropriate under communism.
The library is now working to computerize its collection. Lack of appropriate facilities to store its collections which increase every day remains a key obstacle.
