The world's largest and most important section of Chinese texts, out of print since 1939, has been prepared for by Elling O. Eide '57, teaching follow in Chinese.

The collection, The Gau-pu ts'ung k'an Collected Printing in the Four Cate will be the largest publication Chinese undertaken in the West.

The Ssu-pu ts'ung k'an contains his and literary texts dating from 600 to the twentieth century. It includes basic material for the scholar, most untranslated elsewhere. Teachine research in Chinese studies are impossible without these texts.

In 1939 the Commercial Press of collected what they regarded as the most accurate versions of the 468-odd works in the set, and reproduced the original Chinese character texts in facsimile. They are taken from manuscripts and woodblocks relatively free from type graphical errors and editorial alterations One error in the printing or editing of a Chinese character alters its meaning completely, making accuracy extremely important.

However, only about 20 complete sets and scattered single volumes of the 1000 odd sets originally published in China an extant in U.S. Sinological institutes and libraries. Their current market price in Hong Kong is $6500 and up.

Elde and his colleagues counted the 600,000 pages and collated the texts of three sets of the Sau-pu ts'ung k'an to prepare it for reprinting. The 250-volume reprint edition will cost $3000 a set when re-issued.

The Collection, awaiting publication a the Johnson Reprint Corporation in new York, cannot go to press until the company receives 75 orders to cover the estimated $400,000 cost of printing.