Zhonghua Book Company (simplified Chinese: 中华书局; traditional Chinese: 中華書局; pinyin: Zhōnghuá Shūjú) is a publisher in China with a focus on humanities, especially on classical Chinese works. Its headquarters is located in Beijing.
Zhonghua Book Company was established by Lufei Kui, a famous educational thinker and publisher in Shanghai in January 1912.
In accordance with the aim of “Enlightening the People”, Zhonghua edited and published mainly textbooks and popular cultural readings in its early years, and contributed to the spread of science and culture and the promotion of modern education. Therefore Zhonghua developed rapidly into a modern comprehensive publishing enterprise across the country, its publications covering social and natural science, from ancient times to contemporary era, also well-known overseas.
In 1958, Zhonghua became a professional publisher of ancient and modern classics on humanities. Since then, Zhonghua published a good many ancient texts and classics on literature, history, philosophy and language, such as A General Mirror for Governing the World, Collected Inscriptions on Tortoise Shells or Animal Bones, Collected Inscriptions on Ancient Bronze Objects of Shang and Zhou Dynasties, A Collection of Chinese Buddhism Texts, and Wangli’s Archaic Chinese Character Dictionary, among which “Twenty-four Histories”(punctuated) and A Draft History of the Qing Dynasty were regarded as the greatest projects in the field of publishing. Series of books and magazines published by Zhonghua provide abundant basic booklists, and files and data for academic research, enjoying a wide-ranging influence and trust in academy, readers, and education circles, the same as the Chinese references and dictionaries.
In the recent years, Zhonghua explored on the way to a multi-enterprise and made new contribution to carrying forward and popularizing excellent Chinese culture. For example, “True Stories” series start up a wind of reading historical popular readings, and 1587, A Year of No Significance (Commemorative Edition) and “Chinese Classic Collection” also win their reputations respectively.
Zhong Hua has produced about 20,000 titles in its 95 years of publishing, in which almost 200 have been awarded various prizes.