Tibet Bookstore opens in Beijing

A new bookstore in Beijing purports to be the largest bookstore in China dedicated to Tibetan culture and language. Part of the government-owned Xinhua chain of bookstores, the "Tibet Bookstore" (北京西藏书店) was co-founded by the Tibetan People's Publishing House and the Beijing Dingchunde Real Estate Group (which provided space for the bookstore), and opened June 28th, a date significant for its proximity to the birthday of the Chinese Communist Party (July 1). This year is also the 60th anniversary of China's takeover of Tibet.

Though the bookstore is of course a government-controlled outlet, there are relatively few politically-charged titles on offer: most of the selection deals with Tibetan culture, art, religion and travel, in the Chinese language. A small Tibetan-language section offers Tibetan books and magazines that may be hard to find elsewhere. Among the books that might be considered overt propaganda is Xu Mingxu's anti-Dalai Lama work, Disgrace on Snow Mountain: The Origins and Development of the Unrest in Tibet (雪山下的丑行: 西藏暴乱的来龙去脉), from the Sichuan Education Press.

A fair amount of fiction is on offer. Though the works of Wei Se, a Tibetan poet and writer, are unlikely to be available, Tibet-focused novels such as The Tibet Code (藏地密码) by He Ma, Tibetan Mastiff (藏獒) by Yang Zhijun, the novels of A Lai (阿来), and Tibetan Love of Living and Dying（西藏生死恋，by Yu Qian, can be found, including the newly-released Tianzang (天藏) by Ning Ken, which is not available elsewhere. Academic journals and Tibetan music are also on sale.

The Tibet Bookstore is located in Beijing, on the 1st floor of Wenbo Dasha, Gaoyuan Street, North Fourth Ring Road, Chaoyang District
(朝阳区北四环东路高原街文博大厦一层).

Bookstore staff did not permit photography, but some photos can be seen online here.