Literature Finding Guide

Find a Book

The library catalog can be searched in several ways.

Subject Searches

Subject Searches are good when you only have a general topic, like quilting or how to paint. Remember, subject searches are not written in "natural" language. If you are looking for books on how to paint, you have to think of what subject that would be under (Painting technique).

Select Subject from the search screen in the online catalog and type a search term. The results will list the broad subject and its sub-categories. Click on the subject term to view our holdings for this subject.

Examples:

• American Drama
• English Poetry

If your search produces no results, consider using a keyword search.

Keyword Searches

Keyword Searches are good when you are looking for a type of book and you can't think of a subject heading. For books on how to paint, you can type "how to paint" in the keyword search box. This will give you books that have the words how and paint in the title or description.

Select Keyword from the search screen in the online catalog and type a search term.

• Search for a phrase: British Poetry (will look for the words British and Poetry)
  You could put quotation marks around the phrase "British Poetry" and the search would bring back items that have the words "how to paint" as an exact phrase.
• Search for keywords: or Faulkner Criticsim (will look for the words Faulkner and Criticism)

If you find a book you like, look at the subject heading. Use the subject heading to do another search for more books.

Common Call Numbers

You may also wish to browse the shelves in the following call number areas to locate books.

• 810 American literature
• 820 English and Old English
• 830 Germanic languages
• 840 Romance languages
• 850 Italian & Romanian literatures
• 860 Spanish & Portuguese
• 870 Italic literatures, Latin
• 880 Hellenic literatures, Classical Greek
• 890 Literatures of other languages

Find an Article

Use an index to find articles about a topic. Indexes and full-text magazines and newspapers are available at the library and through our website. To use the library's online indexes, go to Research & Subject Guides and select Databases. The databases listed below are under Literature Criticism on the database page.

• Literature Resource Center

You can use a subject or a keyword search to find magazine articles. If you have a complex topic, use a keyword search.

If you are looking for an article published around or prior to 1980, you will need to use a print index. Print indexes are available in the Periodicals Department on the third floor.

• Poole's Index to Periodical Literature, 1802-1906
• Reader's Guide to Periodicals, 1900-

Magazines at the Library

• Explicator
• Hudson Review
• Southern Literary Journal
• World Literature Today
• Shakespeare Quarterly

Reference Books

Art Reference materials are located in the Fine Arts room, separate from the general reference collection. Selections include:

• Contemporary Authors (REF 928 C764)
• Dictionary of Literary Biography (REF 809 D5546)
• Poetry Criticism (REF 809.1 P745)
• Twentieth Century Literary Criticism (REF 809.04 T971)