To get general and background information on a topic or subject, search your concept in a reference database or browse a reference book.
Examples:
-opens new windowLanguage & Literature Book Titles
-opens new windowLiterature Topic Pages

In the Library Reference Collection, use call numbers to browse the shelves or search for titles.

Browse the shelves in the PN-PZ call number sections of the Reference Collection. To find specific reference titles, search the library catalog and limit results to "Reference Collection." Materials are shelved in Library of Congress (LC) call number order, so similar subjects will be shelved next to each other.

See: opens new window Library of Congress Classification Outline, Class P - Language and Literature. Click a subclass to view specific call number sections.

General Reference - Use for brief background information, brief biographical information, etc.

• Cassell's Encyclopaedia of World Literature - PN41. C3
​Includes "Histories of the Literature of the World," "General Literary Subjects," and biographies of authors.
• Companion to the American Short Story - PS374.S5F33
See Table of Contents. Includes national literatures, forms of literature, articles on individual authors (with some pictures), and a list of Nobel Prize winners for literature 1901-1962.
• Concise Encyclopedia of Modern World Literature - PN41. C64
See Table of Contents. Includes national literatures, forms of literature, articles on individual authors (with some pictures), and a list of Nobel Prize winners for literature 1901-1962.
• A Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory - PN41. C83
• A Dictionary of Writers and Their Works - PN451. C99
• Handbook to Literature - PN41.H6

Subject Specific Resources

• African-American Writers - PS153. N5. A3444
• Asian American Novelists - PS153. A84. A825
• Flannery O'Conner: An Annotated Reference Guide to Criticism - PS3565. C57.Z857
• Harlem Renaissance - NX512.3. A35R63
• Magill's Guide to Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature - PN3433.8. M24
• Native American Literatures: An Encyclopedia of Works, Characters, Authors, and Themes - PS153. I52.W47
• The Oxford Companion to Women's Writings in the United States - PS147.O94
• Science Fiction and Fantasy Literature 1975-1991 - PN3448.S45R4212