National and University Library in Zagreb (Croatian: Nacionalna i sveučilišna knjižnica u Zagrebu, NSK; formerly Nacionalna i sveučilišna biblioteka u Zagrebu, NSB) is the national library of Croatia and central library of the University of Zagreb.
The national library was founded in 1607. Its primary mission is the development of the national literary corpus. It has around 2.5 million books.
NSK is currently located in a standalone building in the center of Trnje on the Hrvatske bratske zajednice street, where it moved in 1995. The building is the work of renowned Croatian architects Velimir Neidhardt, Marijan Hržić, Zvonimir Krznarić and Davor Mance, and its construction took six years (1978-1984).
Famous quotes containing the words national, university and/or library:
“The principle of all sovereignty resides essentially in the nation.”
—French National Assembly. Declaration of the Rights of Man (Sept. 1791)
“Like dreaming, reading performs the prodigious task of carrying us off to other worlds. But reading is not dreaming because books, unlike dreams, are subject to our will: they envelop us in alternative realities only because we give them explicit permission to do so. Books are the dreams we would most like to have, and, like dreams, they have the power to change consciousness, turning sadness to laughter and anxious introspection to the relaxed contemplation of some other time and place.”
—Victor Null, South African educator, psychologist. Lost in a Book: The Psychology of Reading for Pleasure, introduction, Yale University Press (1988)
“Knowing I loved my books, he furnished me
From mine own library with volumes that
I prize above my dukedom.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)