Research Guides: Literatures in English: Home

Welcome! This guide is a detailed introduction to research resources in the area of English and American Literature. It was put together by subject librarian Amanda Rybin Koob. I welcome your feedback regarding resources in the collection as well as your purchase suggestions.

The English and American Literature print book collection is located on the third floor of the Norlin Library stacks. These books, as well as the resources linked on this page, support the CU Boulder English Department, Humanities Program, and the greater CU community. The Collection Development Policy governing CU Boulder Libraries is available online.The libraries are committed to Diversity and Inclusive Excellence, and as part of that work I am prioritizing the purchase of literature resources that have been historically underrepresented in libraries. If you have questions or would like to talk, please contact me.

Image Attribution: Reading with Robert Frost. (Photo by Casey A. Cass/University of Colorado)

Get Started

MLA Handbook Plus
Reference source with online access to the MLA Handbook. Ninth edition. Also includes MLA Guide to Digital Literacy and MLA Guide to Undergraduate Research in Literature.

Core Resources

MLA International Bibliography (EBSCO) Essential international index to works about language and literature, produced by the Modern Language Association (MLA). Includes the following collection: MLA Directory of Periodicals.
Literature Online Core (ProQuest) Collection of English and American poetry, drama, and literature, with criticism. From Old English to current literary works.
Literary Reference Source (EBSCO) Full-text literary database covering all genres and time periods. Includes synopses, critical essays, book reviews, literary journals and author biographies, plus full-text classic novels, short stories and poems.
Gale Literature Resource Center Biographical information, overviews, full-text literary criticism and reviews on more than 130,000 writers across disciplines and time periods. International in scope. Also includes citations for books, articles, and dissertations.
EBSCO Arts & Literature Full-text articles and indexing of academic journals covering a broad range of subjects in the humanities and social sciences.
JSTOR Digital library of academic journals, books, and primary sources.
WorldCat (OCLC FirstSearch) Most comprehensive database of worldwide library holdings. Limited to 40 simultaneous users across the state of Colorado.

New Featured Resources

Poetry and Short Story Reference Source (EBSCO) Full-text database containing classic and contemporary poems, short stories, biographies, essays, lesson plans and learning guides. Includes high-quality videos and audio recordings from the Academy of American Poets.
Literary Reference Source (EBSCO) Full-text literary database covering all genres and time periods. Includes synopses, critical essays, book reviews, literary journals and author biographies, plus full-text classic novels, short stories and poems.
Adam Matthew Explorer (Adam Matthew) Searches content across Adam Matthew primary source collections.
Drama Online (Bloomsbury) Drama Online introduces new writers alongside iconic names in playwriting history, providing contextual and critical background through scholarly works, practical guides, audio and visual material.
Oxford Guide to British Women Writers This resource provides a guide to a wide range of British women's writing, from the earliest times to the present.
Complete Prose of T. S. Eliot (Project Muse) This collection gathers the collected, uncollected, and unpublished prose of T.S. Eliot. It contains collected essays, reviews, lectures, commentaries from The Criterion, and letters to editors, including more than 700 uncollected and 150 unpublished pieces from 1905 to 1965.