About the Collections

The Children's Literature Center assists users in gaining access to all children's materials dispersed throughout the Library. The Library holds approximately 500,000 children's books and related items, such as boxed and board games, sound recordings, maps, and illustrations. The books, and all other materials, can be searched and in many cases retrieved by accessing the Library's online catalog.

Children's books are grouped together in the PZ section of the general collection, for here are housed fiction, poetry, and folklore in English and some European languages. However, nonfiction children's books are shelved in their respective subject areas. In short, children's materials are scattered throughout the Library's complex collections of more than 130 million items.

For example, non-English language children's books are housed in the respective language divisions; maps for children are held by the Geography and Map Reading Room; bound children's periodicals are shelved in the general collection and more recent unbound periodicals are in the Newspaper and Current Periodical Reading Room; rare children's books are housed in the Rare Book and Special Collections Reading Room; children's books with musical scores can be found in the Performing Arts Reading Room; original children's book art is in the Prints and Photographs Reading Room; children's books in Braille are held by the National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped; and television programs for children are in the Motion Picture and Television Reading Room.