Emiko SUNAGA (Project Research Fellow)
How often do you use the National Diet Library? Did you know that you can find almost any book that was published in Japan there?
If you have trouble locating a specific source of literature in the university library or your local library, the National Diet Library becomes your last resort, but getting there can be a hassle, or simply be too far away for some people. Then how about this: what if you could browse books from the National Diet Library on the internet?
The Digitized Contents Transmission Service for Individuals does exactly that. It provides online access to some of the materials in the National Diet Library’s collection. The service was launched in 2022.
The National Diet Library had previously made many of its materials available on the Internet. This time, it has opened a service that provides access to out-of-print literature and hard-to-find digitized materials. Previously such resources were only available at the library’s terminals. To use the service, users must have an account on the website and the registration requires submission of an identification document, like a driver’s license (the whole procedure can be completed online).
The word ‘transmission’ in the name of the service does not mean that you physically receive the material you are looking for. Instead, you can view it in real time by clicking on the name of the material from a device of your choice, like a computer. Similar to an e-book or webcomic, you can go back and forth between the pages, as well as zoom in and out.
National Diet Library Digital Collections
Upon opening the Digital Collections homepage, just below the search bar, you will find three filters: ‘Available without login,’ ‘Available with Digitized Contents Transmission Service,’ and ‘Available only at the NDL.’ Nothing is selected by default, so let’s choose the second option, ‘Available with Digitized Contents Transmission Service’.
For example, let’s take the Holy Qur’an (Koran), an important primary source in the study of the Islamic region, which also happens to be my specialization. In Japan, the Qur’an has been published since pre-war times, but much of it is out of print. Using the Digitized Contents Transmission Service, you can view old Qur’ans held by the National Diet Library.
Login page for the Digitized Contents Transmission Service
Cover of the Holy Qur’an كلام شريف in Arabic, published by the Tokyo’da Matbaa-i islamiye in 1934.
Fatiha (the opening chapter of the Qur’an). You can scroll through pages continuously or jump to any page by specifying the panel number.
The zoom function allows clear reading of shakl (Arabic diacritics).
Author’s notes (originally written in Japanese)
The Holy Qur’an in Japanese from 1920 translated by Kenichi Sakamoto, which is said to be the first Japanese translation of the holy book, is available on IIIF (the first edition falls under the ‘Available without login’ category and can be viewed by anyone without registration, while other editions require a login to the Digitized Contents Transmission Service).
This kind of old book, even if you manage to get hold of the original, must be handled with care and should not be skimmed through casually. We should feel grateful to be able to view the pages in such good quality whenever we want.
Furthermore, in the future, it will be possible to print out the books from the collection at home, making the service even more useful.
The COVID-19 pandemic forced many libraries to close their doors temporarily or permanently, but it also accelerated the move to make library books available online.
The Asian Research Library is another institution in the process of digitizing its collections, and I highly recommend checking it out.
* The batch of materials released this time online through the Digitized Contents Transmission Service is only a small part of the entire collection of the National Diet Library. There are also many materials that are not digitally available to the public but can be requested online via the Remote Photoduplication Service.
*The process of photography, which is indispensable for digitization of the materials, is featured in the National Diet Library Monthly Bulletin No. 733 (May 2022). The article offers a peek behind the scenes of this huge project, including reflections of the photographer’s fingers, episodes of filming with a ruler and information on 200 hard disks used throughout the process.
National Diet Library Digital Collections
https://dl.ndl.go.jp/
National Diet Library Monthly Bulletin (in Japanese)
https://www.ndl.go.jp/jp/publication/geppo/index.html
Asian Research Library Digital Collections of University of Tokyo (in Japanese)
https://iiif.dl.itc.u-tokyo.ac.jp/repo/s/asia/page/home
March 6, 2024