Gene Smith

A Tibetan Buddhist monk reads from a traditional Tibetan book sitting in his lap.

How an American scholar saved a trove of Tibetan literature from extinction

February 28, 2014Lifestyle & Belief

The late American scholar Gene Smith spent a quarter of a century collecting endangered works of Tibetan literature in Cambridge, Massachusetts. One of his life’s aims has now been realized, as Smith’s collection has found a permanent home in a new library of traditional Tibetan works in the southwestern Chinese city of Chengdu.