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English Literature: Dictionaries & encyclopedias

Dictionaries of Literary Terms

Struggling with the distinction between structuralism and post-structuralism? How is a metaphor different from a simile? Dictionaries of literary terms are invaluable for concise explanations of the specialized language of literary scholarship.

Encyclopedias and Bibliographies

Specialized scholarly encyclopedias are useful for acquiring basic background information on a topic and are valuable places to start your research.  Unlike Wikipedia, these encyclopedias are written, reviewed, and edited by academic experts. Consulting an encyclopedia in the early stages of your research can help you define your key terms, situate your topic in its wider scholarly context, find related fields of inquiry, and even locate important works of research that may be contained in the bibliographies at the end of each entry. What follows is a list of general literary encyclopedias and bibliographies- but be sure to sure the library catalogue for more specific encyclopedias by period (e.g. Modernist), geography (e.g. Canadian literature), genre (e.g. science fiction), form (e.g. the novel) or even by major author (e.g James Joyce).

Language Dictionaries

Language dictionaries give brief definitions of unfamiliar words, phrases, and acronyms.