This month’s focus will be on Gale Literary Sources.
This database takes advantage of metadata and subject indexing and provides the user with new ways to explore content.
This database takes advantage of metadata and subject indexing and provides the user with new ways to explore content.

When you access the search tools within Gale Literary Sources you essentially are conducting a cross-search in all of the following collections:
Literature Criticism Online - One of the largest, most extensive compilations of literary commentary available.
Literature Resources Center - Offering up-to-date biographical information, overviews, full-text literary criticism, and reviews on more than 130,000 writers in all disciplines, from all time periods, from around the world.
MLA International Bibliography - Citations for hundreds and thousands of books, articles, and dissertations from 1926 to the present, linked to full text where available.
LitFinder - Containing a wealth of literary works, including over 150,000 full-text poems and 800,000+ poetry citations, as well as short stories, speeches, and plays.
Subcollections of GVRL titles - Including Scribner Writers and Twayne's Authors.
Dictionary of Literary Biography - Complete online, signed scholarly essays that provide essential context to understand the careers and writings of more than 12,000 authors from all time periods and all parts of the world.
Something About the Author Online - Engaging biographies of classic, contemporary, and emerging authors and illustrators of children's and young adult literature.
Contemporary Authors Online - Current biographical and bibliographical data on more than 120,000 modern authors
Literature Criticism Online - One of the largest, most extensive compilations of literary commentary available.
Literature Resources Center - Offering up-to-date biographical information, overviews, full-text literary criticism, and reviews on more than 130,000 writers in all disciplines, from all time periods, from around the world.
MLA International Bibliography - Citations for hundreds and thousands of books, articles, and dissertations from 1926 to the present, linked to full text where available.
LitFinder - Containing a wealth of literary works, including over 150,000 full-text poems and 800,000+ poetry citations, as well as short stories, speeches, and plays.
Subcollections of GVRL titles - Including Scribner Writers and Twayne's Authors.
Dictionary of Literary Biography - Complete online, signed scholarly essays that provide essential context to understand the careers and writings of more than 12,000 authors from all time periods and all parts of the world.
Something About the Author Online - Engaging biographies of classic, contemporary, and emerging authors and illustrators of children's and young adult literature.
Contemporary Authors Online - Current biographical and bibliographical data on more than 120,000 modern authors
There are several unique ways you may want to utilize this resource. As you can see from the menu, you can conduct a Basic Search, Advanced Search, Person Search, and Works Search.
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Working with the results right column:
Content Types -There are various types of media content retrieved for your results. Each result will yield various media types. At the top you will notice a breakdown of the number of artifacts from each content type for your particular search. (Please note that your specific search may need to be refined to yield better results). Searching within Results – This feature is very good for finding specific key words from within all the results currently on display. This is a big time saver when you are not finding what you thought should have come up. Limiting your Search- As previously noted, it is best to get to information that best answers your informational need. The search limiters enable you to make adjustments that will fine tune your results. Subjects- I highly recommend you expand (by pressing the + button) the subjects results that come up. This will give you a much broader picture of the options you have for going further and fine tuning your quest for information. Document Type – Here as well I suggest to expand the retrieved results as many types of documents are brought to your attention and you may least expect these types of documents. Analyze with Topic Finder - See next section for greater details. Advanced Search continued - See following section below for more detail. |
Analyze with Topic Finder:
Pressing the Topic Finder tool at this point will sort out the information displayed on the screen within the two options available in Topic Finder (Tile view or Wheel view). To learn more about how to best use TopiC Finder click this link to ItsLearning lesson. |
Advance Search:
Web search engines have turned many information seekers to compromise with regards to the results that are brought to them. The more control you have over your search criteria, the better results you will be able to extract. All Gale Cengage databases have Advanced Search capabilities enabling you to have as much control as possible over your search results. Optimal results may be achieved through good use of Boolean logic operations and adding as many rows as needed. |
Here is a brief clip explaining the simple way to use Boolean Search operators.
If you would like further help with Advanced Search please let me know. |
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Watch this 4:20 minute clip to become familiar with the basics of Gale Literary Sources. |
Watch this 4:10 minute clip to become more familiar with how to become better at search . |
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Watch this 5:45 minute clip to better understand how to work with the documents in the database. |