By GAIL FINEBERG
James H. Billington was awarded an honorary degree (D.Phil.) from Oxford University on Nov. 8, 2002, as part of a celebration of the 400th anniversary of Oxford's Bodleian Library, which was founded in 1602.
A public orator of Balliol College, where the Librarian received his doctorate in Russian history in 1953, read the citation for the degree of doctor of letters (D. Litt.) in Latin. Excerpts from the English translation follow:
"We all know the famous declaration of the poet Milton: 'A good book is the precious life blood of a master spirit.' But who is it who takes charge of the books, who looks after them, and who duly produces them and makes them available to us as readers? For that we owe a debt of gratitude to the noble army of librarians."
"Dr. Billington presides over a library of enormous resources, which possesses more books, perhaps, than any other. …"
The orator commented on Billington's vision of opening the Library's resources to the world via the Internet: "… we have before us a man convinced that books are for use and meant to be read. He is thoroughly acquainted with the whole range of humane subjects, and he has worked to make the riches of his Library generally accessible, using computerized equipment of enormous power, which secures easy access even for those of us who are not, perhaps, highly computer literate. There is a program called Thomas, which, surprisingly, is free from doubt or ambiguity of any kind."
After citing Billington's academic and publishing background, the orator presented the degree: "A Balliol Orator presents to a Balliol Chancellor a Balliol man, James Hadley Billington, the recipient of many honors, a great scholar, a great communicator of scholarship, and the head of a very great library, for admission to the honorary degree of Doctor of Letters."
Oxford, the oldest English-speaking university in the world, is Billington's alma mater. A Rhodes Scholar, he received a doctorate from Balliol College in 1953 after graduating with highest honors from Princeton University in 1950. The orator noted that Billington then pursued his studies in Russia, Finland and France, and has published books about Russian history and literature. Knowing Russia before and after the Communist system, the orator said, Billington "handles those enormous and highly complex subjects with the greatest erudition and insight."
Billington has received 33 honorary degrees, as well as the Woodrow Wilson Award from Princeton University (1992), the UCLA Medal (1999), and the Pushkin Medal of the International Association of the Teachers of Russian Language and Culture (2000). Most recently, he was awarded honorary doctorates from the University of Tblisi in Georgia (1999) and the Russian State University for the Humanities in Moscow (2001).
The other Oxford award recipients on this occasion were Lynne Brindley, chief executive of the British Library; Sir Brian Follett, chairman of the Arts and Humanities Research Board for the United Kingdom; and Paul LeClerc, chief executive officer of the New York Public Library.
The Bodleian Lib-rary was founded by the scholar and diplomat Sir Thomas Bodley and opened to readers on Nov. 8, 1602. As one of the most heavily used libraries in the world, its reading rooms seat more than 2,000 readers and serve the general public, as well as Oxford scholars. Its Hebrew manuscripts are considered by many experts to be the finest collection anywhere, and its scientific department is the largest nongovernment library for science and technology in Europe. Its law library gives open access to the largest selection of legal material anywhere in Britain. Its 9 million manuscripts, maps, musical scores, printed books, microforms, and electronic datasets occupy 107 miles of shelving.
Gail Fineberg is the editor of the Library's staff newspaper, The Gazette.