Library

Databases

Key English & American Literature Databases

Reference databases (sometimes also called "citation" or "abstract" databases) can help you to find journal articles if you want to search more widely for papers, especially if you're doing a literature review for a dissertation.

The full text may not be available from the citation database, however clicking on the @Keele logo will search our e-journals and provide a link to the whole paper if available, or direct you to where a paper copy may be found in the Library's print journal collection.

EBSCO
Academic Search Complete contains the full text of over 8500 journals covering almost every area of academic study.
You will need your Keele username and password password to access the EBSCO databases from off-campus.
View the Quick Guide to Using EBSCO.

Eighteenth-Century Collections Online
A vast, digital library of items published between 1701 and 1800, including every significant English-language and foreign-language title printed in the United Kingdom along with thousands of important works from the Americas.
You will need your Keele username and password to access Eighteenth-Century Collections Online from off-campus (look for the shibboleth access option to log-in).
View the Quick Guide to using ECCO.

LION – Literature Online
A fully searchable library of more than 350,000 works of English and American poetry, prose and drama, plus biographies, bibliographies and key criticism and reference resources, including full online access to the MLA International Bibliography.
You will need your Keele username and password to access LION from off-campus.
View the Quick Guide to Using LION.

ProQuest 
Includes access to the British Humanities Index, an international abstracting and indexing tool for research in the Humanities. It indexes around 400 Humanities journals from the UK and other English-speaking countries.
You will need your Keele username and password to access ProQuest from off-campus.

Web of Knowledge
A gateway to the Web of Science, which includes the Arts and Humanities Citation Index, ISI Proceedings, Journal Citation Reports and ISIHighlyCited.com.
You will need your Keele username and password to access the Web of Knowledge from off-campus.
View to Quick Guide to Using Web of Knowledge.

E-Journal Collections

American Studies Journals

Many journal articles can be accessed through searching the databases listed in the section above. In addition, the following services may be of use:

19th Century UK Periodicals Online
A searchable database of 100 periodical titles published in the UK between 1800-1900. Titles included cover the spectrum of women's writing and chart the rapid rise of children's entertainment and education. Also included is a broad spread of satirical and comic titles.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using 19th Century UK Periodicals Online.

British Periodicals Collection I & II
An archive that consists of more than 460 periodical runs published from the 1680s to the 1930s.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.

JSTOR
A searchable full text archive of over 130 important journals.  JSTOR is not specifically a collection of Literature journals but does include titles such as: American Literature; ELH and Shakespeare Quarterly.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using JSTOR.

SwetsWise
Another searchable collection of electronic journals with full text access to over 3000 journals, including some titles relevant for English Literature.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using Swetswise.

To find a specific e-journal title, or to browse what is available, go to the e-journals search. For help using the ejournals search, take a look at this quick video tutorial.

To find out what titles are available in the Library's print collection, use the Print Journals search on the Library Catalogue.

E-book Collections

English & American Literature Books

Use the Library Catalogue to search for individual titles held by the Library.

In addition, several ebook collections are available for you to use. These allow you to read books in full, online. View the Quick Guide to Using Keele's ebooks for help starting to use these collections.

Dawsonera
An expanding collection of ebooks purchased by the Library which includes some titles relating to Literature.
You will need your Keele username and password to access individual ebooks and to access the collection off-campus.

Early English Books Online
The full text of more than 125,000 books in English from 1473 to 1700, including some published in the USA.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using EEBO.

EBSCO Ebook Collection
A large collection of ebooks with many texts on all aspects of literature, culture and history. 
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.

MyiLibrary
A collection of ebooks purchased by the Library which includes some titles relating to Literature. The collection is developing and new titles will continue to be added.
You will need your keele username and password for off-campus access.

Project Gutenberg
A large collection of freely available online texts in all subjects although predominantly literature.

You may also like to look at Google Books. Whilst this does not provide access to the full text of many books, you can access limited previews for some titles.

Selected E-books for Literature

Looking for an ebook on Literature?

The following are suggested titles in our collection. Many more are available from the Library catalogue. You will need your Keele University username and password to log-in to the ebooks.

(N. B. Students should of course refer to, and follow, guidance on reading provided by tutors or module handbooks in the first instance).

American Literature

Gray, R.J. (2003) A history of American literature. Oxford : Blackwell.

Contemporary Literature

Bentley, N. (2008) Contemporary British fiction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Bentley, N. (2005) British fiction of the 1990s. London: Routledge.

Bradford, R. (2007) The novel now: contemporary British fiction. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Head, D. (2002) The Cambridge introduction to modern British fiction, 1950-2000. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Hutcheon, L. (1988) A poetics of postmodernism: history, theory, fiction. New York: Routledge.

McHale, B. (2004) Postmodernist fiction. London: Taylor and Francis.

Creative Writing

Morley, D. (2007) The Cambridge introduction to creative writing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Film

Cartmell, D. (2000) Classics in film and fiction. London: Pluto Press.

Buchanan, J. (2005) Shakespeare on film. Harlow: Pearson Longman.

Gothic Literature

Botting, F. (1996) Gothic. London: Routledge.

Punter, D. and Byron, G. (2004) The Gothic. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Smith, A. (2007) Gothic literature. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Spooner, C. and McEvoy, E. (2007) The Routledge companion to Gothic. London: Routledge.

Literary Theory and Criticism

Amigoni, D. (2000) The English novel and prose narrative. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

Castle, G. (2007) The Blackwell guide to literary theory. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Childs, P. and Fowler, R. (2006) The Routledge dictionary of literary terms. London: Routledge.

Culler, J. (2000) Literary theory: a very short introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Mullan, J. (2006) How novels work. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Poetry

Furniss, T. (2007) Reading poetry: an introduction, 2nd edition. Harlow: Pearson Longman.

Wainwright, J. (2004) Poetry: the basics. London: Routledge.

Weiss, S.W. (2008) The art of poetry: how to read a poem. New York: Oxford University Press.

Postcolonial Literature

Ashcroft, B. (2002) The empire writes back: theory and practice in post-colonial literatures, 2nd edition. London: Routledge.

Boehmer, E. (2005) Colonial and postcolonial literature: migrant metaphors, 2nd edition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Loomba, A. (2005) Colonialism/postcolonialism, 2nd edition. London: Routledge.

Renaissance and Early Modern Literature

Corns, T.N. (2007) A history of seventeenth-century English literature. Oxford: Blackwell.

Fernie, E. (2005) Reconceiving the renaissance: a critical reader. New York: Oxford University Press.

Hattaway, M. (2005) Renaissance and reformations: an introduction to Early Modern English literature. Malden, MA: Blackwell.

Research and Study Skills

Eaglestone, R. (2002) Doing English: a guide for literature students, 2nd edition. London: Routledge.

Fabb, N. (2005) How to write essays and dissertations: a guide for English literature students, 2nd edition. London: Pearson Longman.

Levin, P. (2005) Sail through exams! Maidenhead: Open University Press.

Neville, C. (2010) The complete guide to referencing and avoiding plagiarism, 2nd edition. Maidenhead: Open University Press.

Price, G. (2007) Effective study skills. Harlow: Pearson Longman.

Romanticism

Day, A. (1996) Romanticism. New York: Routledge.

Victorian Literature

Branhinger, P. and Thesing, W.B. (2002) A companion to the Victorian novel. Oxford: Blackwell.

Cronin, R. et al (2002) A companion to Victorian poetry. Oxford: Blackwell.

Newspapers

Newspapers

The following services provide full-text access to a large number of newspapers.

19th Century British Library Newspapers
The 19th Century British Library Newspapers collection contains full runs of 48 newspapers specially selected by the British Library to best represent nineteenth century Britain. Cross-search this with the Burney Collection by using the British Newspapers 1600-1900 option.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using British Newspapers 1600-1900.

Burney Collection Newspapers (17th to 18th Century)
A digitised collection of newspapers, news-books, pamphlets and ephemera from the 17th and 18th Century. Cross-search this with 19th Century British Library Newspapers by using the British Newspapers 1600-1900 option.
You will need to use your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using British Newspapers 1600-1900.

ProQuest UK News Stand
Provides the searchable full-text of articles published in around 30 UK newspapers including The Times, Telegraph, Guardian and The Independent.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using ProQuest UK News Stand.

Nexis UK
A news and business service which includes around 12,000 publications, including worldwide, national and local newspapers.
You will need to use your Keele username and password for both on-campus and off-campus access to Nexis UK.
View the Quick Guide to Using Nexis UK.

The Times Digital Archive
Search the complete digital edition of The Times from 1785-2006. The entire newspaper is captured with all articles, advertisements and illustrations/photos.
You will need your Keele username and password for off-campus access.
View the Quick Guide to Using The Times Digital Archive.

Theses

Theses

Use the advanced keyword search on the Library Catalogue and set the material type to 'thesis' to search for Keele these held in the Library.

ETHOS
The British Library ETHOS project provides electronic access to research theses from many UK universities.

Index to Theses
A searchable listing of theses with abstracts accepted for higher degrees by universities in Great Britain and Ireland since 1716. You can only access the Index to Theses from computers on the Keele network.

NDLTD – Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
Details of theses and dissertations from universities in the United States and worldwide.

PhDData
An index of doctoral dissertations in progress around the world.

Other Useful Links

The First World War Poetry Digital Archive
An online repository of over 4000 items of text, images, audio and video. The heart of the archive consists of a collection of highly valued primary material from major poets of the period.

Google Scholar
The most famous web search engine can search for academic journals and literature too. You can use the 'Scholar Preferences' options to set Google Scholar to recognise which articles you have full-text access to through Keele's subscriptions. View the Quick Guide to Using Google Scholar to see how this can be done.

Intute: Humanities
A free online search service providing you with access to quality Web resources for English and other subjects in the Humanities.

RefWorks
This is an online reference management software which can be used to import, manage and save references from your research, enabling easy creation of bibliographies. Find out more on our Refworks information pages.
View the Quick Guide to Using RefWorks.

Zetoc
Use this site to set up e-mail alerts to your inbox when new issues of journals are published. Zetoc will send you an e-mail containing the new issue’s table of contents.

Guides and Tutorials

The following tutorials are available:

Internet Detective
A free online tutorial offering practical advice on evaluating the quality of websites.

Internet for English
A free, simple, interactive tutorial to improve online research skills for English.

Online Reading Lists for English and American Literature

Online Reading Lists for English

Online Reading Lists for English and American Literature

View reading lists for English and American Literature online.

When viewing your list, select any resource to view more details, including  links to ebooks, ejournals and websites and the availability of print copies in the Library. From here, you can access the library catalogue to view additional details, place a reservation or use other borrower services

Sign-in with your Athens username and password if you wish to add personal study notes to your lists.