Jin Shen's life track is unusually "lucky", and every key step is to step on the right drum: he entered the business before the Cultural Revolution, keeping up with the best teachers and having rare teachers: during the Cultural Revolution, he did not interrupt his career and became the first batch of humanities scholars to visit the United States after the reform and opening up, which broadened his horizons; After 30 years of hard work and considerable knowledge accumulation, he got the opportunity to work in Harvard Yanjing Library. In more than ten years, generate has completed many important academic works with brilliant academic brilliance. His life dealing with precious ancient books is not thin, but also envied by book lovers.
Jin Shen has always looked down on his knowledge and often talks about "bridal dresses for other girls". As a particularly lucky person who has seen countless precious ancient books, Jin Shen believes that he has the responsibility to pass on these precious ancient books and let more people know and use them: "Academics are the public tools of the world, the ancient books collected are public tools, and the achievements made by scholars using these ancient books are also public tools, all of which are resources * * *. Writing books and cataloging is another interpretation of China culture. This interpretation is useful to many people. Why not? " This is his motivation to keep writing.
In addition to his professional works, Jin Shen has been keen on blogging in recent years. His screen name is "Old Squirrel among Books", which is taken from Zhang Yuanji's poem "I am an old squirrel among books, and I wander by the camel bridge". It's better to admire the immortal's words than to be silent. Jin Shen's blog is a professional topic, which is related to what he has seen and heard in the past decades. It is lively in writing, writing books, people and stories, remembering old friends and teachers, popularizing knowledge or denouncing shortcomings. It is rich in content and easy to write, even for ordinary readers. It is a well-known professional blog in the academic field of ancient books, which not only attracts many readers, but also attracts publishers to compete for publication. Some time ago, Jin Shen "shared" his blog articles with Guangxi Normal University and Zhonghua Book Company, and published two collections of essays, Essays on Reading Old Squid and Essays on Reading Old Squid. At the same time, the China Rare Books Series of Harvard University's Harvard Yanjing Library (6 volumes in total) edited by him is also published by Guangxi Normal University Press.