Literature Resource Center Library

What is Literature Resource Center?

Designed as the place to access biographies, bibliographies, and critical analyses of more than 120,000 authors from every age and literary discipline.Scribner Writer&acutes Series includes 15-20 page signed essays on more than 1,600 authors and literary genres drawn from 13 acclaimed Scribner print series.Twayne World, US, and English Authors each contains the full text of 200 frequently used Twayne Literary Masters books on individual World, US, or English authors, for a total of 600 full-text titles.Now let us learn how to effectively search this collection!

Starting Point

Literature Resource center is designed to provide multiple access points to biographies, bibliographies, and critical analyses of the work of more than 120,000 authors.

Search Options Include:
– Search by author.
– Search by title.
– Authors by type: where you specify gender, year of birth, year of death, ethnicity, nationality, genre, theme, and literary movement or time period.
– Keyword search.
– Browse by Literary-Historical Timeline.

Not sure who to write about?Try Browse by Literary-Historical Timeline to look for ideas.

Search by Author

If you already know who your author is, search by author is one way to go.

Here, the student is looking for information on Mark Twain.

As you can see, there a number of results.An example of a result is "Samuel Langhorne Clemens," in Contemporary Authors. (A profile of the author&acutes life and works) There are 12 similar listings on the biography of Mark Twain, also known as Samuel Langhorne Clemens as the Literature Resource Center points out for you. It also gives you a quick snapshot of the man&acutes life.

– Samuel Langhorne Clemens

– (1835-1910)

– Variant(s): Sieur Louis de Conte; Quentin Curtius Snodgrass; Thomas Jefferson Snodgrass; Mark Twain; Samuel Clemens

– Nationality: American

– Genre(s): Essays; Young adult literature; Short stories; Travel literature; Autobiographies; Literary hoaxes; Humorous works;

– Satires; Journalism; Adventure fiction; Speeches; Historical fiction; Children´s literature

– Literary Movement/Time Period: American realism (Literature)

Once you have all the biographical information you need, you can go on to look for "Literary Criticism, Articles and Work Overviews," Bibliographies, and Additional Resources by clicking on the tabs of your choice.

If you see any articles you think you might want to save for later, simply click the boxes next to the articles.That will save these articles for you to browse through later on, email them to yourself or someone else, or print them out.

Using the Tabs

What is a literary criticism?The simplest way to put it is that a literary criticism is a written evaluation and / or analysis of a work of literature.So here we are looking at the evaluations and analyses of Mark Twain&acutes work.

Clicking on the "Bibliographies" tab will take you to articles that provide you with a comprehensive list of all of Samuel L. Clemens, aka Mark Twain´s works.

Still want more information on Mark Twain?You are definitely in luck because Literature Resource Center offers you a list of additional resources as shown below.

Search by Title

For those of you who might not know the name of the author but do know part of or the entire title, this is the search method for you.

You can narrow your search by choosing one of the following options that are offered.

– Any words entered
– All words entered
– Exact title

Note:You will get the most results if you have the exact title. In using The Prince and the Pauper as an example, the student was able to retrieve 14 titles by searching by "Exact Title" as opposed when using the other two options, which both retrieved only half that or 7 titles.

Authors by Type

Authors by type is an extensive way to search for an author.This is a great way to find an author if you do not have a name, but are interested in a specific era, genre or even ethnicity!

This search allows you to search for an author by selecting gender, year of birth, year of death, ethnicity, nationality, genre, theme, and literary movement or time period.

You can select as many or as few options as you want, depending on the amount of information you have available.

Keyword Search

Keyword search is for those of you who want an author or a title about certain topics.

Let´s suppose that we want all authors and titles about cats, dogs and 1965.The search resulted in 55 hits.

Advanced Searches

For you advanced searchers, this may be the way for you to go.

Advanced searching is an exhaustive way to search.It covers every possible way to narrow your search.Take a look at all the avenues available to you in this method.

Browse by Literary-Historical Timeline

Take your cursor across the faces of the many authors and names will appear.This will give you a good idea of what was going on during the times listed.

This is a great resource for those of you who want to know what was going on during the lifetime of your author or time era that you are researching.

Citing Documents in Literature Resource Center

In general, the correct citation format is as follows:

Eisinger, Chester E. "Herzog: Overview" Reference Guide to American Literature, 3rd ed. 1994. Literature Resource Center. Gale Group Databases. East Los Angeles College Library, California. 10 Mar. 2002 <http://www.infotrac.galegroup.com>

For complete citation guidance, please refer to the appropriate style guides such as:

– MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers, 6th Edition,

– Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association, otherwise known as the APA Style Handbook.

Note that complete bibliographic citations of the sources reproduced also appear in many of the biographies and critical essays included in LRC.

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