UEA Library: Literature and Creative Writing: Resource directory

Featured resources

Key resources for Literature

There are hundreds of thousands of books and journal articles related to literature available via Library Search. Here are some other resources you may find useful.

Literary Encyclopedia This link opens in a new window
A core resource for literature students. It aims to provide biographies of all major writers and entries for their works in addition to information about the historical and cultural context of literary events. Useful features include recommended reading, a timeline of works and events, a glossary and a style guide. Note that it is being built up over time, so not all content listed is yet available.
ProQuest One Literature This link opens in a new window
ProQuest One Literature is a vast scholarly resource, including more than 500,000 primary texts 1,200 scholarly journals and thousands of ebooks and reference works. It also includes 1,300 video and audio recordings and the full text of 14,000 dissertations. A particular focus of One Literature is to extend beyond the Western canon to include a wide range of Black and World literary resources.
Modern Languages Association (MLA) International Bibliography This link opens in a new window
Offers a detailed bibliography of journal articles, books and dissertations. Subjects consist of literature, language and linguistics, folklore, literary theory & criticism, and dramatic arts, as well as the historical aspects of printing and publishing. A core resource for literature students.
Oxford English Dictionary (OED) This link opens in a new window
An essential and definitive reference work on the English language, tracing the meaning, history and pronunciation of 600,000 words, with 3.5 million quotations to demonstrate their usage in the past and today.
Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (ODNB) This link opens in a new window
Over 60,000 biographies of significant figures who shaped British history, society and culture from Roman times to 21st century (but note it only includes people who have died).
Cambridge Companions Online (CCO) This link opens in a new window
Cambridge Companions provide scholarly authoritative guides, written by leading experts, to major writers, artists, philosophers, topics, and periods. UEA has access to the full set of Companions.
Oxford Scholarly Editions Online (OSEO) This link opens in a new window
Online versions of scholarly editions of key literary and historical works. UEA has purchased modules for: Medieval Poetry and Prose, Renaissance Prose, the New Oxford Shakespeare, 18th Century Poetry, Drama and Prose, Romantics Poetry, Drama and Prose.
Oxford Bibliographies: American Literature This link opens in a new window
Expert bibliographies on topics related to American Literature. Note that UEA Library may not have all the items in the bibliography, so you will need to check if we have access or request that the Library obtains it.
Oxford Bibliographies: British and Irish Literature This link opens in a new window
Expert bibliographies on topics related to British and Irish Literature. Note that UEA Library may not have all the items in the bibliography, so you will need to check if we have access or request that the Library obtains it.
Oxford Bibliographies: Literary and Critical Theory This link opens in a new window
Expert bibliographies on topics related to Literary and Critical Theory. Note that UEA Library may not have all the items in the bibliography, so you will need to check if we have access or request that the Library obtains it.
Oxford Bibliographies: Renaissance and Reformation This link opens in a new window
Expert bibliographies on topics related to the Renaissance and Reformation. Note that UEA Library may not have all the items in the bibliography, so you will need to check if we have access or request that the Library obtains it.

For newspaper and magazine content, please see our new dedicated guide, which covers both current and historic papers and magazines.

Other resources for Literature

Credo Reference This link opens in a new window
A cross-searchable online reference collection, featuring full-text content from over 1,000 reference books covering a broad range of subjects. Contains over 3.5 million entries, 200,000+ images (art, diagrams, maps and photos) and over 100,000 audio pronunciation files and sound clips.
Oxford Reference Online: Premium Collection This link opens in a new window
A fully-indexed, cross-searchable database of hundreds of dictionaries, encyclopaedias and other reference works published by Oxford University Press.
Oxford Dictionaries This link opens in a new window
Fully searchable, completely comprehensive bilingual dictionaries with accompanying study materials that provide extra help with learning. UEA has French, Spanish and Chinese dictionaries on this site.
Oxford Handbooks Online (OHO) This link opens in a new window
E-books providing current and authoritative subject coverage. Handbooks are frequently updated and offer thorough introductions to topics and a critical survey of the current state of scholarship in a particular field of study.

Discovering Literature
Explores the social, political and cultural context in which key works of literature were written. includes digitised texts from the British Library along with commissioned articles, short documentary films and notes for teachers.

Communication and Mass Media Complete This link opens in a new window
Communication & Mass Media Complete indexes journals in areas related to communication and mass media, such as translation. Includes links to some full-text.
Box of Broadcasts (BoB) This link opens in a new window
A national TV and radio recording and streaming service for UK higher and further education institutions. Includes over 2 million recordings of films, documentaries, news and radio programmes from 75 channels, with the ability to request upcoming programmes and create playlists and clips.
EBook Central This link opens in a new window
Multi-subject collection of e-books which can be browsed, read online or downloaded to a PC. Access is also available to titles not currently owned by UEA. These may be browsed and requested for purchase by the library.
JISC Historical Texts This link opens in a new window
Brings together four significant collections, which can be cross-searched: Early English Books Online (EEBO), Eighteenth Century Collections Online (ECCO) along with 65,000 general texts from the British Library's 19th Century collection and 79,000 19th century medical texts. Nearly half a million printed texts from the late 15th to 19th century. EEBO can also be accessed via the ProQuest platform (see separate A-Z database entries).

Hathi Trust
A vast collection of digitised books. Some are closed due to copyright restrictions, but many are available to read and download.

Seventeenth and Eighteenth Century Burney Newspapers Collection This link opens in a new window
The largest collection of 17th-18th century English news media available from the British Library. Includes more than 1,000 pamphlets, proclamations, newsbooks and newspapers, with regional and international papers covering 1600-1799.
British Library Newspapers This link opens in a new window
Drawn from the British Library's collections, UEA has access to Parts 1 and 2, providing a wide range of regional newspapers from 1800-1900.
19th Century UK Periodicals This link opens in a new window
UEA has Part 1 of this series, focusing on UK periodicals relating to women, children, humour and leisure and illustrating the rise of magazine publishing in the 19th century. Drawn from the collections of the British Library, National Library of Scotland, National Library of Australia, and National Library of South Africa.
Empire Online This link opens in a new window
Brings together manuscript, printed and visual primary source materials for the study of 'Empire' and its theories, practices and consequences. Spans last five centuries and is accompanied by many secondary learning resources including essays, maps and an interactive chronology.
Listener Historical Archive, 1929-1991 This link opens in a new window
Established by the BBC in 1929 as the medium for documenting radio - and later, TV - programmes in print, it is the only record of many early broadcasts. It also included contributions from many major UK writers and poets.
Drama Online This link opens in a new window
Contains the full text of more than 2,000 plays from Greek drama to the present day, along with information about playwrights and genres. Note that we have access to most of the plays, but do not subscribe to the videos - a range of production videos can be viewed on Digital Theatre+
Digital Theatre+ This link opens in a new window
Digital Theatre+ is an online platform for the performing arts. It provides unlimited access to over 600 productions along with hundreds of educational resources.
Times Literary Supplement (TLS) Gale Historical Archive, 1902-2019 This link opens in a new window
An important source for book reviews and literary essays and debates. For the latest issues, use the Exact Editions version of the TLS.

Times Literary Supplement (TLS), Exact Editions, 2010-
Full digital access to current and recent issues of the TLS
Granta - full digital edition
Access to the full archive of the literary journal Granta from the 1980s to the latest issue

Guardian and Observer, up to 2003 This link opens in a new window
Search the full-text of the Guardian (1821-2003) and Observer (1791-2003) and view facsimile page images. For more recent articles use Gale Research Complete or Nexis and use PressReader to view the most recent issues.
New York Times Archive, 1851-2020 This link opens in a new window
Search the full-text of this important American newspaper up to 2020. For more recent articles (text only), see Gale Research Complete or Nexis - links in Newspapers Subject Guide.
Times Digital Archive, 1785-2019 This link opens in a new window
Searchable text and full facsimile of the Times newspaper from 1785. Can be cross-searched with other papers via Gale Primary Sources (see separate Database A-Z entry).
Nexis Advance UK This link opens in a new window
Database containing thousands of newspapers and news sources (text only format), including Le Monde, New York Times and the Financial Times. Also contains business information such as company profiles and industry news.
Underground and Independent Comics This link opens in a new window
Large collection of rare and hard to find comics from across the world along with journals and other supporting literature.
Project MUSE This link opens in a new window
Provides access to ebooks and journals in the arts and humanities. UEA-owned content held on the MUSE platform can also be found via Library Search. Some content showing as not held on MUSE may be available to UEA on other platforms.
JSTOR journal back issues This link opens in a new window
JSTOR provides searchable back issues of scholarly journals on a wide range of subjects. JSTOR does not include the last few years of most of its journals, so for recent and current issues, use the Journal A-Z or Library Search.
Shakespeare Survey Online This link opens in a new window
A yearbook detailing Shakespeare studies and productions. Published since 1948, it has published some of the the best international scholarship on Shakespeare in English and many of its essays have become classics of Shakespeare criticism.
EThOS This link opens in a new window
National service run by the British Library to increase visibility and access to UKs doctoral research (PhD) theses. There are more than 600,000 records with about half of these full-text, either directly available from EThOS or via links to the institution's own repository. Note that you will need to register with EThOS to download theses.
ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global This link opens in a new window
ProQuest Dissertations & Theses (PQDT) Global holds details of millions of dissertations and theses from around the world. In August 2022 UEA upgraded from the abstract and index version to the full-text version (containing more than 3 million full-text)
Cite them right This link opens in a new window
An online referencing tool providing answers to common questions about referencing, as well as helpful guidance to keep you on the right track. Cite any information source, from ancient texts to Twitter and other online publications. Referencing styles supported are Harvard, APA, Chicago, IEEE, MHRA, MLA, OSCOLA and Vancouver. Provides videos and tutorials and includes guidance on plagiarism and how to avoid it.