English and Literature Courses--How to find literary criticism: Criticism in books

Use the Library Catalog to locate books about your author and their works (biographies and books of criticism and interpretation). These print books are in the Literature section (P call numbers) of Stacks location on 2nd floor and may be checked out. Look up your chosen literary work in the index in the back of these books before checking it out. Ask for help if you need it.

Search by typing your author's name with the phrase "and criticism" Click the subject button below the search box.

For example type: william faulkner and criticism   Click the subject button to run the search.

• The list of results shows names of books about your author that contain criticism essays. Most of them will have the same or a similar call number, because each author is assigned their own call number, which causes books either by or about the author to be grouped together.
• Any books that say ONLINE after their call number are eBooks. Please read the box below about eBooks. If you are using the catalog while off campus, you need to go to the database Ebook Collection (Ebscohost) and log in to get to the book. 
• You can print the catalog page showing your search results before heading to the call number location in the Stacks.
• If a book is about more than one author, it is usually in a different call number location. Go find these books and see what is covered in the book. 

Click to open the Library Catalog:  Library Catalog

The catalog opens in a new window. Exit the catalog by clicking the X and return to this guide. 

While using the Library Catalog, you will usually find some of our eBooks, those that say "ONLINE", or "ELECTRONIC RESOURCE" in the catalog information. If you are on a computer ON campus, click the URL link for the eBook in the catalog pages to open them.  If OFF campus, login to access these resources, which means first finding these books in the database eBook Collection (EbscoHost).

• While using the Library Catalog, make note of any eBook titles you want to find in the eBook Collection database. After clicking the database link (above), login to the database by using your netID@my.lsco.edu login.
• Search the database by a book title, or search using the author's name, combining with the phrase "and criticism." Using author's name and the story title may also work. The phrase "criticism and interpretation" is in the subject headings for books with collections of critical essays.

For example, type: william faulkner and criticism

You may want to view this short tutorial about using our eBook database - [TUTORIAL]

(At this time, our eBooks are not downloadable to book reader devices as suggested in the tutorial.)

• The eBook database opens in a new window. Click X to leave the database and return to this guide.

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