The process of researching various types of literature
requires the use of several kinds of information resources such as books
( print and electronic), journal article indexes including full text databases,
reference resources in print and electronic formats, and online resources
collected from the internet. This subject guide attempts to pull together
these various types of information resources to help make the literature
research process a little easier for the students of Northeastern State
University in Broken Arrow. Please contact a librarian if you have questions
concerning these resources or need additional assistance in the research
process.
Some of the most useful and productive resources
for locating criticism or reviews of particular works of literature are
journal literature indexes. Many times these indexes include the actual
"full text" of the article online. If a particular article isn't available
online, it may be available through document delivery from our other campuses,
or through Interlibrary Loan (ILL). NSU subscribes to several large journal
databases which you may find useful. Please ask a librarian for assistance
if you have any questions regarding any of these resources.
| MLA
International Bibliography (To search this database, select this item from the database list while in Ebscohost) |
"MLA International Bibliography
is a bibliography of journal articles, books and dissertations. Produced
by the Modern
Language Association, the electronic version of the Bibliography dates back to 1963 and contains over 1.5 million citations from more than 4,400 journals and series and 1,000 book publishers." Ebscohost |
| Academic
Search Premier (To search this database, select this item from the database list while in Ebscohost) |
"The world’s largest academic multi-disciplinary database, Academic Search Premier provides full text for more than 3,800 scholarly publications, including full text for nearly 2,800 peer-reviewed journals. Coverage spans virtually every area of academic study and offers information dating as far back as 1975." Ebscohost |
| MasterFILE
Premier (To search this database, select this item from the database list while in Ebscohost) |
"Designed specifically for public libraries, this multidisciplinary database provides full text for nearly 2,000 general reference publications with full text information dating as far back as 1975. Covering virtually every subject area of general interest, MasterFILE Premier also includes 314 full text reference books, nearly 100,000 biographies, 76,000 primary source documents, and an image collection of 116,000 photos, maps and flags." Ebscohost |
| Books
in Print with Reviews (To search this database, select this item from the database list while in Ebscohost) |
"Includes approximately
2.5 million bindings for books that are in print, forthcoming, or declared
out-of-print or out-of
stock-indefinitely since 1979, as well as more than 500,000 full-text reviews. Also includes Books Out of Print." Ebscohost |
| Essay General Literature | "Find contents in collected works focusing on humanities and social sciences." Firstsearch (not full text) |
| Book Review Digest | "Reviews of current English-language fiction and nonfiction books" Firstsearch |
| Periodical Abstracts | "Periodical abstracts from general and academic journals" Firstsearch (Contains full text) |
| Arts and Humanities Citation Index | Firstsearch. Some full text. |
| Wilson Omnifile (Humanities Index component) | Excellent resource with a large amount of full text articles available. |
A concise reference book on "how" to begin researching
literature is:
| Title | Call Number | Location |
| Research Guide for Undergraduate Students: English and American Literature | PR 56 .B34 2000 | Reference BA Library |
The NSU BA Library has a growing Reference collection
of literature research materials. Some of the most useful print resources
in the reference collection are:
| Title | Call Number | Location |
| World Literature Criticism | PN 523. W67 1992 | Reference BA Library |
| Reference Guide to World Literature | PN 524. R44 1995 | Reference BA Library |
| Contemporary Authors | PN 451 .C58 | Reference BA Library |
| Contemporary Authors New Revision | PN 451 .C59 | Reference BA Library |
| Authors and Artists for Young Adults | PS 490. A98 | Reference BA Library |
| Young Adult Writers | PS 490 .S7 1999 | Reference BA Library |
| Reference Guide to American Literature | PS 129 .R44 2000 | Reference BA Library |
| Reference Guide to English Literature | PR 106 .S7 1991 | Reference BA Library |
| Reader's Encyclopedia of Shakespeare | PR 2892 .C3 1997 | Reference BA Library |
Netlibrary NEW! Netlibrary e-books
Netlibrary is an online collection of approximately 25,000 academic and reference books including many excellent resources for literature research. To search for materials written "by "a particular author, simply enter the authors last name first in the author search field. To look for materials "about " a particular author (such as criticism) enter the authors name in either the subject, key word, or full text search field. To search for criticism of particular works, enter the full title (or unique key words from the title) in the subject, key word, or full text search field. Try several combinations of the above search strategies to gain a more complete search of the database.
Other Sources of Electronic Books
| Project Gutenberg | Project Gutenberg is the Internet's oldest producer of FREE electronic books (eBooks or eTexts). |
| Bartleby.com | Online library of classics, poetry, verse, and research |
| Oxford Text Archive | The OTA works closely with
members of the Arts and Humanities academic community to collect, catalogue, and preserve high-quality electronic texts for research and teaching. The OTA currentlydistributes more than 2500 resources in over 25 different languages. |
| Electronic Text Center -Univ. of Virginia | "The Electronic Text Center's holdings include approximately 70,000 on- and off-line humanities texts in thirteen languages, with more than 350,000 related images (book illustrations, covers, manuscripts, newspaper pages, page images of Special Collections books, museum objects, etc.) " UVA Text Ctr. |
| Making of America (MOA) U Michigan | "Making of America (MOA) is a
digital library of primary sources in American social history from the
antebellum period through reconstruction. The collection is particularly strong in the subject areas of education, psychology, American history, sociology, religion, and science and technology. The collection currently contains approximately 8,500 books and 50,000 journal articles with 19th century imprints. The project represents a major collaborative endeavor in preservation and electronic access to historical texts." U Michigan |
| Wright American Fiction 1851-1875 -U. of Indiana | "This is a collection of 19th
century American fiction, as listed in Lyle Wright's bibliography American
Fiction, 1851-1875. There are currently 2,887 volumes included (2,463 unedited, 424 fully edited and encoded) by 1,387 authors." U. of Indiana |
| Representative Poetry Online U. of Toronto | Representative Poetry Online, version 3.0, includes about 2,900 English poems by over 400 poets from Caedmon, in the Old English period, to the work of living poets today. It is based on Representative Poetry, established by Professor W. J. Alexander of University College, University of Toronto, in 1912 (one of the first books published by the University of Toronto Press), and used in the English Department at the University until the late 1960s. |
Masterplots Complete CDROM 2000 edition
Call Number: Reference PN44 M35 2000 ( CD-ROM located in the audio visual collection in Broken Arrow) * Use Station 1 in the Reference Area to use this product.
"Masterplots Complete covers the contents of 80 volumes
of Masterplots and Masterplots II, plus entries from Cyclopedia of Literary
Characters, Cyclopedia of Literary Characters II, and World Authors II.
It includes short biographies, critical essays for the best known works
of adult, young adult, and children's authors, as well as works of non-fiction,
short stories, and works of drama. The search engine makes the information
searchable by title, author, locale, genre, subject, and principal characters"
Masterplots . Masterplots includes the following full text resources:
|
|
|
| African American Literature | Masterplots II :African American Literature Series |
| American Fiction | Masterplots II : American Fiction Series |
| Author Biography | Cyclopedia of World Authors |
| British Fiction | Masterplots II : British and Commonwealth Fiction |
| Character Profiles | Cyclopedia of Literary Characters |
| Drama | Masterplots II : Drama Series |
| Juvenile Series | Masterplots II : Juvenile and Young Adult Fiction |
| Masterplots II : Juvenile and Young Adult Biography | |
| Masterplots II : Juvenile and Young Adult Literature | |
| Classics in Literature | Masterplots Second revised edition |
| Masterplots Definitive revised edition | |
| Masterplots Revised American Fiction edition | |
| Masterplots Revised British Fiction edition | |
| Masterplots Revised European Fiction edition | |
| Nonfiction | Masterplots II : NonFiction Series |
| Poetry | Masterplots II : Poetry Series |
| Short Story | Masterplots II : Short Story Series |
| Women's Literature | Masterplots II : Women's Literature Series |
| World Fiction | Masterplots II : World Fiction Series |
Oxford English Dictionary Online Oxford English Dictionary Online
"The Oxford English Dictionary is the accepted authority on the evolution of the English language over the last millennium. It is an unsurpassed guide to the meaning, history, and pronunciation of over half a million words, both present and past. It traces the usage of words through 2.5 million quotations from a wide range of international English language sources, from classic literature and specialist periodicals to film scripts and cookery books. The OED covers words from across the English-speaking world, from North America to South Africa, from Australia and New Zealand to the Caribbean. It also offers the best in etymological analysis and in listing of variant spellings, and it shows pronunciation using the International Phonetic Alphabet." OED Online
Internet Resources for Literature Research
The internet
| The IPL Literary Criticism Collection | The IPL Literary Criticism Collection
contains critical and
biographical websites about authors and their works that can be browsed by author, by title, or by nationality and literary period. |
| Bartleby.com | Online library of classics, poetry, verse, and research |
| Literary
Resources on the Net
by Jack Lynch |
"This set of pages is a collection of links to sites on the Internet dealing especially with English and American literature, excluding most single electronic texts, and is limited to collections of information useful to academics -- I've excluded most poetry journals, for instance." Jack Lynch |
| Digital Librarian-Literature Links | Digital Librarian: a librarian's choice of the best of the Web |
| Gale Literary Index | Use the Gale Literary index to locate citations to references within the whole collection of Gale products such as Contemporary Literary Criticism, Poetry Criticism, etc. While not a full text resource, it does provide excellent indexing to the vast Gale collection. Most of the resources cited will be available at the Central Library of the Tulsa City/County Library System |
| Luminarium | Medieval Literature (1350 - 1485) |
Tulsa City/County Library
Tulsa City/County
Library maintains one of the best collections of literary research materials
in the state of Oklahoma. Some of the most useful print resources for literary
research are available at the Central Library and include the following
materials. Online access is available to some of these resources for patrons
residing in Tulsa County with a current library card. For current policies
concerning online access or to apply for a library card, please contact
a local branch of the TCCL system. More information is available through
the link below.
| Tulsa City County Library Home | Use the Gale Literary Index to search these resources. | |
| Title of Resource | Call# | TCCL Location |
| Children's literature review | 010 C437l | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Classical and medieval literature criticism | 809.02 C569. | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Contemporary literary criticism | 809.04 C76 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Dictionary of literary biography | 810.9 D561 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Dictionary of literary biography documentary series | 810.9 D561v | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Drama criticism . | 809.2 D79 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Literature criticism from 1400 to 1800. | 809.03 L712 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Nineteenth-century literature criticism . | 809.034 N622 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Poetry criticism | 809.1 P752 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Shakespearean criticism | 822.33 D101 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Short story criticism | 809.31 S559 | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| Twentieth-century literary criticism | 809.04 G131t | Central Library-Tulsa City/County |
| For a complete list of literary materials at Tulsa City County Library go here: | ||
| Tulsa City County Library's Literature Pathfinder is available here: |
Style manuals are available in the NSU Broken Arrow Library to assist patrons with proper paper formatting and citation styles. The most commonly used style manual for the field of literature is published by the Modern Language Association (MLA). The MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers is available in the NSU BA Reference collection under Call # Ref. LB 2369 .G53 1999.
Another useful style manual guide is Form & Style written by Carole Slade Call # Ref. LB 2369 .C3 2003. Her book covers the basic formats of not only MLA style, but also APA style and Chicago style. Be sure to discuss specific research paper styles with your instructor before you complete your research project.
Additional online resources for style manuals
| John Vaughan Library's style manuals page by Linda West |
| MLA Style- Citing Electronic Resources by UW-Madison Writing Center |
| MLA and APA Style examples from Dartmouth University |
| MLA FAQ from MLA |
William Shakespeare
Research Resources Online
| Shakespeare Resource Center | "You'll find here collected links from
all over the
World Wide Web to help you find information of all sorts on William Shakespeare." SRC Homepage |
| Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet | Includes interesting timelines and graphical renderings. |
| All Shakespeare via ENOTES | Easy to use site coving most of his major works. |
| Shaking the Shakespeare Blues | Great site with lots of links put together by the staff of Norman Public Schools. |
| Folger Shakespeare Library | "The Folger Shakespeare Library, a private research institution, is the world's most significant repository of Shakespearean material. Its holdings, which include thelargest collection of English Renaissance books outside of the U.K." Folger Library Homepage |
| Folger Library - Teaching Shakespeare | Resource from the Folger Library that is targeted toward Middle and High School students. |
Copyright Northeastern State University
For problems or questions regarding this web contact
Tom
Messner.
Last updated: 04/07/03.