Reed College Library: Russian

There are many handbooks, dictionaries, and encyclopedias that provide basic information. If you are not clear about your topic, try establishing its limits with a good definition and some introductory information. The following general sources can give you a quick overview or summary of a topic, and you can find other, more specialized resources in the Reference Room:

Handbooks, Dictionaries, and Encyclopedias

General Literature

A Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory
Ref PN41 .C83 1998
"A comprehensive dictionary of literary terms which are in regular use in the world today."

Encyclopedia of World Literature in the 20^th Century
Ref PN771 .E5 1999 (4 v.)

European Writers
Ref PN501 .E9 1983
Articles about author's time, life, and works. Bibliographies follow each article. 14 vols.

A Glossary of Literary Terms
Ref PN41 .A184 2005
Defines and discusses terms, critical theories, and points of view commonly used in the analysis and interpretation of literary works.

New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics
Ref PN1021 .N39 1993
History, theory, technique, and criticism of poetry from earliest period to present. Available online through Literature Online.

Russian Literature

Handbook of Russian Literature
Ref PG2940 .H29 1985
Excellent source for starting your research. Includes short bibliographies to get research started.

Reference Guide to Russian Literature
Ref PG2940 .R44 1998
Articles about the major Russian writers and their works.

Bibliographies and History of Russian Literature

Dictionary of Russian Women Writers
Ref PG2997 .D53 1994
Life and works of 448 authors.

Early Modern Russian Writers, Late Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries
Ref PG2991.2 .E17 1995
Articles about a writer's times, life and works.

Nineteenth-century Russian Literature in English: A Bibliography of Criticism and Translations
Ref PG3012 .P76 1990

Russian Literature in the Age of Pushkin and Gogol. Poetry and Drama
Ref PG2991.3 .R866 1999

Russian Literature in the Age of Pushkin and Gogol. Prose
Ref PG3093 .R79 1999

Literary Criticism and Critical Theory

Contemporary Critical Theory: A Selective Bibliography
Ref PN81 .M37 C6 1993
Lists books on contemporary critical theory and on the works of the leading individual theorists.

Dictionary of Concepts in Literary Criticism and Theory
Ref PN41 .H36 1992
Essays on seventy concepts of special importance to literary theory.

Encyclopedia of Contemporary Literary Theory: Approaches, Scholars, Terms
Ref PN81 .E63 1993

Encyclopedia of Literary Critics and Criticism
Ref PN86 .E63 1999
"Guide to literary theory and criticism past and present." Entries cover individuals, theories and concepts in both Western and non-Western theory and criticism. 2 v.

Twentieth-century Literary Movements Dictionary
Ref PN597 .T94 2000
"Entries on major and minor literary movements and schools associated with Twentieth-century world literature." Includes entries on individual writers identified with those movements, such as novelists, poets, dramatists, theorists, etc.

Single-author Guides

These are a sample of single author reference guides that are available in the library.

Anton Chekov: A Reference Guide to Literature
Ref PG3458 .Z8 L36 1985
Works by Chekov written after 1887; works before 1887 limited to the most important. Works about Chekov limited to 1200 titles in Russian, English, French and German, but heavily weighted to English language materials. Arrangement in both sections is chronological.

Fedor Dostoevsky: A Reference Guide
Ref PG3328.27 .L4 1990
Writings by and about Dostoevsky. Critical writings from 1846 - 1988 are limited to the "best" and were chosen to illustrate changing critical patterns.

Locating Books

To locate books, look in the online library catalog. If you know the author or editor, search Author, last name first. To search by Title, you must know the first few words of the title, but you do not have to know the complete title. To search successfully by Subject, you must use subject terms from the Library of Congress Subject Headings. These can be found in large red books directly behind the Reference Desk.

If you cannot find a particular subject, try a keyword search. Once you locate some appropriate book titles, make note of the subject headings assigned to them. You can then do a subject search on those headings to locate more books. Alternatively, you can check the stacks for other books with similar call numbers.

To search for books in the Summit system, access the library catalog as usual, and select button "Search in Summit" above the record. If you find books in Summit which are not owned by Reed, you can request the books directly from the catalog. You will need to enter your barcode number (it is on the back of your Reed ID card). You will be notified when the book arrives. The borrowing period is three weeks with one renewal allowed.

Finding Journal Articles and Essays

Indexes (sometimes called databases) allow you to search the contents of periodicals to identify articles on your topic. Some indexes are inter-disciplinary, and some focus on a particular subject area. Some contain fulltext or links to fulltext from other sources. Many include citations for books, dissertations, and conference papers as well as journal articles.

After you find a citation for an article, you will need to check the Print & Electronic Journal page to see if Reed subscribes to the journal and if we have the particular issue.

If the article you are looking for is not available at Reed, you can request it from Interlibrary loan (periodicals cannot be borrowed from Summit).

Academic Search Premier (1975 - present)
A multi-disciplinary database containing fulltext for nearly 4,000 scholarly publications. In addition to the fulltext, the database offers indexing and abstracts for nearly 7.700 journals.

Arts & Humanities Citation Index (1975 - present)
As part of the "Web of Science" (along with the Social Sciences Citation Index and the Science Citation Index). The three indexes may be searched singly or together. Enables searching of references cited in books and journal articles, as well as subject, author, and title searching.

Essay and General Literature Index (1985 - present)
Ref AI3 .E78
Use this database to find essays and articles contained in collections (i.e. books) of essays and miscellaneous works published in the United States, Great Britain, and Canada. Print is available from 1900 - 1998.

JSTOR
Searchable electronic archive of the fulltext of journals. Coverage is from journal's first date of publication to three to five years before the present date.

Literary Index
"Gale's Literary Index is a master index to every literary series published by Gale. It combines and cross references more than 130,000 author names including pseudonyms and variant names and more than 140,000 titles into one source."

MLA International Bibliography (1926 - present)
Ref PB1 .M521
Annual bibliography of books, periodical articles, dissertations, and festschriften for the entire field of modern languages and literatures. Available in print 1921 - 1962.

Periodicals Index Online (Coverage varies)
An electronic index to the contents of thousands of periodicals in the humanities and social sciences, from their first issues to 1993. Every article is indexed. Easy to search for book reviews.

Short Story Index (1984 - 1997)
Ref PN3373 .S382
It is an index to short stories written in or translated into English that have appeared in collections and selected periodicals. The periodicals are those indexed in Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature and Humanities Index. 1984-1993 is available in print in the reference room and 1984-1997 electronically.

Library

Research Guide for Russian Literature

Contact: Jennie McKee , Access Services Librarian

Getting Started