World book dealers beat Iran to the punch in purchasing Jordac’s books

TEHRAN,July 17(MNA) -- World book dealers and collectors have succeeded in purchasing some of the books of the personal library of Lebanese Christian author George Jordac before Iran made efforts to acquire a part of the collection, the director of the Iran National Library and Archives (INLA) said on Monday. Last year, INLA announced its interest in purchasing the entire collection of books and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad ordered the Ministry of Culture and Islamic Guidance to provide the necessary funds, Es’haq Salahi told the Persian service of the Mehr News Agency. However, the opportunity was lost after the ministry announced that it was not able to provide the funding, he added. In addition, some cultural officials had expressed opposition to the plan to buy the collection, Salahi stated. The Tehran Municipality had also expressed interest in buying the collection. Jordac had said earlier that he would prefer to see his library used for cultural purposes and would not like to see book dealers make a huge profit on the deal. Jordac is the author of “The Voice of Human Justice”, which is a biography of Imam Ali (AS). The author is an enlightened man of letters who wrote the book with sincerity.