Updates to Gale’s Award-Winning Literary Series

| By Gale Staff | Coming January 18th, Gale is making exciting changes to how researchers view articles in some of Gale’s most trusted and popular series for literary analysis and biography including, Literature Criticism Online, Dictionary of Literary Biography Complete Online, and Something About the Author Online. We heard you and in response to customer … Read more

The World’s Most Compelling Responses in Literature

When it comes to literature criticism, Gale continues to be the go-to publisher for researchers. Literature Criticism Online, raises the level of research by offering thoughtful and diverse responses to art, historic events, and literature from around the world. This award-winning series supports the discussion of how the world evolved, cultures have transformed. Offer researchers … Read more

George Washington’s Bookshelf and the Founding of the Novel

| By Eric Bargeron, Layman Poupard Publishing | President’s Day was established in 1968 to celebrate the birthday of George Washington, America’s first chief executive, hailed for his military leadership and his abilities as a statesman. He was a man of action, but John Adams, a bit of a snob, thought Washington was “too illiterate, unlearned, … Read more

Irish Short Fiction: A Saint Patrick’s Day Review

| By Eric Bargeron, Layman Poupard Publishing |

This Saint Patrick’s day, readers of Literature Criticism Online can distinguish themselves from the masses by eschewing green beer and shamrock kitsch, and contemplating instead the many contributions of Ireland to the world of literature. As critic Terence Brown notes in Short Story Criticism, volume 226, “it is scarcely a disputable fact of literary history that Irish prose fiction writers have been drawn to the short story form and have indeed excelled in it.” That volume, which is devoted entirely to Irish writers, includes a lengthy entry on James Joyce. His stories, all of which are contained in the collection Dubliners, are widely considered to be among the best in the English language. Joyce himself was fairly convinced of the importance of the book, even before its publication, as Morris Beja writes in his essay “One Good Look at Themselves”:

During their dispute over the problems in bringing out an edition of Dubliners, James Joyce wrote the publisher Grant Richards that ‘I seriously believe that you will retard the course of civilization in Ireland by preventing the Irish people from having one good look at themselves in my nicely polished looking-glass.’

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A Literary Un-Valentine’s Day

Every Valentine’s Day we are bombarded with idealized images of true love and passion, and for the unlucky in love, the holiday can be difficult to stomach. In the spirit of demonstrating that matters could be worse, we offer two literary anti-love-scenes, taken from the digital pages of Literature Criticism Online. Consider the plight of … Read more

Happy Birthday Louisa May Alcott!

Louisa May Alcott, American author, was born on November 29, 1832, making today the 184th anniversary of her birthday. Alcott is most known for her novel Little Women, but she published many other written works in her lifetime. Her more popular works, like Little Women, were written for the child and young  adult audiences, but Alcott … Read more

Literary Reflections on Thanksgiving

Readers who seek insight into the meaning of Thanksgiving can find a generous serving of literary criticism on the topic in the digital pages of Literature Criticism Online. Perhaps unsurprisingly, authors have found in the holiday a fruitful setting for explorations of family dysfunction and ruminations on the American national character. 

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Exciting Changes Coming to Gale Literature Resources

On December 20th, users of Artemis Literary Sources, Something About the Author Online, Literature Criticism Online, and Dictionary of Literary Biography Complete Online will be automatically updated to a new mobile-responsive experience. These accessibility, usability, and feature-rich updates provide an improved user experience, as well as the ability to cross-search all of Gale’s literature databases … Read more

The Ever-changing State of Literary Criticism

Posted on February 18, 2016

By Larry Trudeau

I was recently reviewing an entry on Charles Dickens’s Great Expectations for an upcoming volume of Nineteenth Century Literary Criticism (NCLC), and was surprised—delighted, really—to see that we were including two reviews of the novel from 1861, the year it was published in book form.

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Evanston Public Library Enhances Patrons’ Experience with Gale’s Vast Online Resources

GVRL eBook Success Story

Posted on November 30, 2015

Lesley Williams is Head of Adult Services at the Evanston Public Library (EPL) in Evanston, Illinois. In the 18 years that she Evanston Public Libraryhas worked there, the library has continually subscribed to products from Gale. Today, as a primary “go to” resource for the library’s broad range of patrons, GVRL eBooks are instrumental in helping EPL fulfill its mission. That mission is to be the heart of the community, promoting the development of independent, self-confident, and literate citizens by providing open access to cultural, intellectual, technological, and informational resources. “GVRL is the only online reference book service that we’ve ever had,” says Lesley.

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