Library Resources for Class 11 English

Finding Literary Criticism (Walt Whitman project)


Reference books offer biographical information and literary criticism, as well as dates and key terms.
  • REF 809 WAR       World Literature Criticism
  • REF 809.1 WOR    World poets
  • REF 810.9 MAG    Magill's Survey of American Literature
  • REF 810.9 UNG     American writers: a collection of literary biographies
  • REF 821              Poets: American and British
Finding books about authors or about their work:
  • The Chapin Online Catalog is now available at home and at school. Go to the Chapin web site -- "Current Students" page or "Library Services" page.
  • Search under the author's name for works of literary criticism as well as biography.
  • Two good subject terms:  [Author's name]--Biography; [Author's name]--Criticism and interpretation.
  • For works of collected criticism or collective biography that include a specific author, do a keyword POWER search using the author's last name AND keywords from the subject terms above.
  • Examples of subject terms for books on American literature: American poetry--19th century--History and criticism; American literature--20th century--History and criticism
Chapin Databases offer biographical and critical articles from books and periodicals:
  • Proquest -- Articles from literary magazines and journals are included in this database of magazine and newspaper articles. For more focused searches, use the author's name and "criticism" or the author's name and title of the work as keywords.
  • NOVEL Databases-Twayne Authors Series -- Book-length literary criticism from 600 reference books.

NY Public Library Databases:
  • Literature Resource Center [HOME ACCESS with NYPL library card] -- Includes articles from reference sources and periodical articles on literary figures from all time periods in such genres as fiction, nonfiction, poetry, drama, history, and journalism.
Bibliography & Citation Help:
  • For models and examples of MLA bibliography format for print and online sources, see US Library > MLA Style for Bibliographies.
  • For help with citing sources, in the text or in footnotes, see the "General Guidelines" and "Citing Indirect Sources" sections of US Library > Footnotes & Endnotes.
  • OR, use NoodleBib to help you format your bibliography entries, get a suggested format for in-text references, and store bibliographies in your own folder on the Web. See the US Library web page, Introduction to NoodleTools, for details.
Last updated by Ms. Lutz, 2  Dec 2007