Databases for Literature
Best Bets
| Database | Description | Coverage | More Info |
|---|---|---|---|
| MLA International Bibliography |
MLA covers folklore, languages, linguistics, and literature. Provides over one million citations for items from more than 4,400 journals and series published worldwide. |
1926-present |
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| Literature Criticism Online |
Provides access to scholarly and popular commentary from broadsheets, pamphlets, encyclopedias, books and periodicals. |
1400-present |
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| Literature Resource Center |
LRC is built upon Gale's three author resources: Contemporary Authors, offering biographical coverage of more than 120,000 modern writers; Contemporary Literary Criticism |
Current and retrospective |
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| Literary Reference Center |
Contains full text for 31,098 plot summaries, synopses and work overviews, nearly 100,000 articles/essays of literary criticism, nearly 140,000 author biographies (including 20,000 in-depth bios), |
Current |
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Also Useful
| Database | Description | Coverage | More Info |
|---|---|---|---|
| Book Review Index Plus |
A comprehensive online guide to book reviews that includes more than five million review citations from thousands of publications, with linking to more than 630,000 full-text reviews. |
1965-present |
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| Books in Print |
Bibliographic descriptions and availability information for more than 5 million books currently in print, declared out of print, or soon to be published titles. Records of in-print, out-of-print, |
Coverage varies |
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| Feminae: Medieval Women and Gender Index |
"Feminae: Medieval Women and Gender Index covers journal articles, book reviews, and essays in books about women, sexuality, and gender during the Middle Ages." |
1990-present |
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| Film and Television Literature Index with Full Text |
Film & Television Literature Index with Full Text provides cover-to-cover indexing and abstracts for more than 370 publications (and selected coverage for nearly 300 publications), as |
Coverage varies |
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| International Index to Performing Arts Full Text |
This database provides indexing and abstracts for more than 260 international periodicals, plus full text for more than 100 of the indexed journals. |
1990s-present |
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| International Medieval Bibliography |
The International Medieval Bibliography comprises 365,000 articles, all of which are fully classified by date, subject and location, and provide full bibliographical records. |
300-1500 |
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| Iter: Gateway to the Middle Ages and Renaissance |
The library's subscription includes the following databases: |
400-1700 |
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| Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism |
Compiled by 275 specialists from around the world, the Guide includes more than 240 alphabetically arranged entries. |
Current |
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| JSTOR |
JSTOR specializes in making available the back issues of academic journals (over 1,000) in a wide variety of humanities and social science disciplines. |
Coverage is the beginning of the journal until two to five years ago. |
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| Project Muse |
Project Muse provides full text access to over 335 journals, and indexing for 200 more in the humanities and social sciences. |
1996-present |
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Even More
| Database | Description | Coverage | More Info |
|---|---|---|---|
| Arts and Humanities Citation Index |
Provides indexing for 1,144 of the world's leading arts and humanities journals, and it indexes individually selected, relevant items from over 6,800 major science and social science journals. |
1975-present |
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| British Literary Manuscripts Online |
British Literary Manuscripts Online presents facsimile images of literary manuscripts, including letters and diaries, drafts of poems, plays, novels, and other literary works, and similar |
1150-1900 |
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| Chaucer Bibliography Online |
The Chaucer Bibliography Online includes materials from the Annotated Chaucer Bibliography published annually in Studies in the Age of Chaucer. |
1975-present |
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| Credo Reference |
Credo Reference provides access to hundreds of reference books (encyclopedias, dictionaries, biographies, quotations) from over 70 academic publishers. |
2000-present |
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| Critical Companions to Popular Contemporary Writers |
Eacj Critical Companions in this collection provides author background; character, plot, theme analysis, and a complete bibliography of books, selected reviews, and criticism. |
1990's-present |
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| Dictionary of Literary Biography |
Featuring comprehensive literary biographies, you'll find profiles of more than 143,000 past and present authors, historians, journalists, screenwriters, publishers, and playwrights. |
1978-present |
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| Early English Books Online (EEBO) |
Early English Books Online (EEBO) contains digital facsimile page images of virtually every work printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America and works in English printed |
1473-1700 |
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| Eighteenth Century Collections Online |
A variety of materials is included—from books and broadsides, Bibles, tract books and sermons to printed ephemera—with works by many well-known and lesser-known authors. |
1700-1799 |
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| English Poetry (600-1900) |
Drawn from nearly 4,500 printed sources, more than 1,250 poets are represented. |
600-1900 |
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| English Short Title Catalog |
All recorded English monographs printed between 1475 and 1700 are now represented in the file, as are eighty percent of the recorded serials titles for the period 1620-1800. |
1473-1800 |
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| Literature in Context |
Titles in the series: The Adventures of Huck Finn; Black Boy; Catcher in the Rye; The Crucible; Death of a Salesman; The Great Gatsby; Hamlet; I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings; Julius Caesar; Li |
2005-present |
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| Something About the Author |
Something About the Author Online covers the lives and works of authors and illustrators of books for children and young adults. |
1971-present |
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| Times Literary Supplement Historical Archive |
The TLS Historical Archive, 1902-2005 provides full-text access to every page of every issue of the TLS from 1902 to 2005, discovering a wealth of material in 300,000 book reviews |
1902-2006 |
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| Twentieth Century American Poetry |
Provides access to 50,000 poems drawn from 750 volumes by over 300 poets, including biographical information on each poet. |
1900-present |
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| Twentieth Century English Poetry |
A collection of more than 600 volumes of poetry by 283 poets from 1900 to the present day, including W.B. |
1900-present |
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| Twentieth-Century African American Poetry |
A collection of modern and contemporary African American poetry, featuring almost 9,000 poems by 62 of the most important African American poets of the last century, including Langston Hughes, Jean |
1900-present |
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| World Shakespeare Bibliography Online |
"The World Shakespeare Bibliography Online is a searchable electronic database consisting of the most comprehensive record of Shakespeare-related scholarship and theatrical productions pub |
1967-present |
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| WorldCat |
Contains over 50 million records cataloged by OCLC member libraries throughout the world: Appalachian State University Library is a member (OCLC member code=NJB). |
1000 BC-present |
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