The Library of Congress Office in Nepal

The Library of Congress, the oldest cultural institution of the United States Government, was founded in 1800 as a government reference library to serve the young nation’s legislature. In the nineteenth century, it grew into a national institution, and since World War II has become an unparalleled library full of texts from all over the world.

The Library of Congress maintains six overseas offices that acquire, catalog, preserve, and distribute library and research materials in all languages of their region. The Library of Congress also acquires publications for American academic libraries and research institutions. The New Delhi office, the largest of these offices, acquires publications from India, and also from Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burma, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, where it maintains sub-offices in the American Embassies. The Nepal office ships all the acquired publications to New Delhi, where they are further processed, cataloged and bound (or microfilmed) and shipped to the Library of Congress to become part of its permanent collection in Washington, DC.

The Library of Congress Country Representative keeps abreast of current scholarship and publishing, acquiring a wide range of materials. A high priority is given to collecting official government publications including important legal materials such as the government gazette, legislative debates and laws, and judiciary rulings. The Library also acquires major newspapers and newsweeklies, scholarly journals, literary as well as lifestyle and other popular magazines, research monographs on the arts, the social sciences and humanities. Increasingly, non-print and electronic media, along with maps, are being sought to supplement traditional book and journal formats. Documenting the activities of social, political and religious organizations and advocacy groups based in the country also form a valuable contribution to the Library’s collections.

To celebrate the Library of Congress Bicentennial in 2000, the New Delhi office launched The South Asian Literary Recordings Project for the Library of Congress' Archive of Recorded World Literature. The project has captured the readings of prominent South Asian poets, novelists, and playwrights. The authors recorded so far represent more than fifteen of the languages of India, Nepal, Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. Eleven prominent writers from Nepal have been recorded for this project and their recordings are available on the Library of Congress website. http://www.loc.gov/acq/ovop/delhi/salrp.

To learn more about the Library of Congress, explore the following sites www.loc.gov and www.loc.gov/acq/ovop/delhi.  Or you may write to locnepal@wlink.com.np for further information.

Library of Congress Representative, Nepal Office
Embassy of the United States of America
Maharajgunj, Kathmandu, Nepal
Tel.: 977-1-400-7200