Books and Magazines Qian Xuesen had read

At the end of NO.4 Exhibition Hall, visitors would be surprised by the huge “book sea” in front of them. This huge book wall consists of 11 rows 7 bookshelves, shows more than four thousand books of Qian Xuesen, which is just one seventh of his all books. 

Books accompanied Qian Xuesen for most of his life. He made friends with books and indicated his life philosophy “live and learn”. This book treasury in the Qian Xuesen Library is a place where he would “go every day” in his school days.

When studying in the Middle School Affiliated with Beijing National Normal University, Qian Xuesen liked to go to the small library in the school, because there were many classic novels and scientific and technical books there. One day, Qian Xuesen learned something about Einstein, creator of relativity theory, from his classmates and decided to find some books and read a brochure introducing relativity theory. Although he was unable to fully understand all the contents, the brochure inspired his great interest in cutting-edge science and technology.

After entering National Chiao Tung University, Qian Xuesen would go to the “red building”, the name of the library in the right side of the university door, every day. He stayed in the library to read newspapers and books. The library was established in 1917, contained 75 thousand books and almost one thousand magazines at the time. It was an important library for nation-wide scientific and technical books and magazines.

The library of National Chiao Tung University provided Qian Xuesen a good platform to read books. As he recalled later, he often spent most of his time in the library. He said, “I read books of any subject, and especially liked the books about science and technology”.

 “I chose the railway mechanical engineering major, but the books I borrowed from the library were not limited to my major. I also read books about airship, airplane and aviation theories. Although I did not fully understand them, I did learn some essentials about aerodynamics theory, which was one of the important majors I worked on afterwards.”

His teacher Jin Que also said, “Qian Xuesen always stayed in the library to dig into and work hard at more subjects, mastering a lot of knowledge that teachers did not cover in class. He knew that there was no end for learning, and worked hard to explore more knowledge.”

After arriving in the US, Qian Xuesen was mainly engaged in scientific research and teaching and the library became more indispensible for him. He would go to the open display stand of magazines once he was available, look over the latest magazines, and absorb new thoughts and fruits to advance his own research.

Qian Xuesen read widely in his entire life, including more than 35000 books, 400 or more magazines and he collected more than 40000 books. Many visitors showed their respect for Qian Xuesen upon hearing that fact, while some raised doubts. They said, “Given that Qian Xuesen was so busy in his work, how did he spare enough time to read so many books?” 

He benefited from his persistent reading habits and positive methods. Influenced by the study atmosphere at the California Institute of Technology, Qian Xuesen did not like watching TV, and spent time in reading books and magazines. Especially from after finishing dinner to midnight every day, he would stay in his study room and read books. This reading habit lasted through his life and it was not interrupted by his newly married period or detention days.

His method of reading books was influenced by his teacher Von Kármán. When you take a book, read the table of contents and preface. Next, read the first and last chapters. This helps reader to know about the book’s outline and to judge whether it is worthy of reading. If it is a good one, repeat reading it; if you think it very common, just browse it. Besides being quite smart and good at summarizing, Qian Xuesen was highly efficient at reading books.  

For Qian Xuesen, reading is an active process of thinking. He would make many comments and notes to express his personal opinions. The thin scraps of paper inserted between pages and the sentences he wrote hurriedly represent his fleeting inspirations, some of which formed macroscopic, specific or systemic theories. 

Qian Xuesen read books, studied and thought about new ideas for years on end. He said, “I have always been learning new knowledge, for stopping learning means falling behind the steps of times.” His son Qian Yonggang recalled, “My father continued to study throughout his life and constantly absorbed nutrition from knowledge. He read books till the day he died!”


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