Conducting Literary Research

How to do Literary Research

What are we looking for?

Criticism What other people think about Beowulf

as a work Possible interpretations of Beowulf The work of scholars and professional

academics Peer-reviewed and researched (just like

yours!)

Author Biography How the author's life affected the book,

if at all Did the author of Beowulf have political

connections?

Whether or not the book affected or influenced other authors

Did Beowulf influence Lord of the Rings?

Book Biography How many times the book has been

translated, and by who Did Beowulf change when it was translated

to English? Whether any of it has been lost,

altered, or censored; and whether that's relevant

Historical context Comments on history

A Tale of Two Cities – commentary about the French Revolution

Context in history Beowulf – set during a certain time (i.e., in

context) how would a real warrior have been expected to

act at that time and in that part of the world?

Databases

Boston Public Library Contemporary Literary Criticism Artemis Literary Sources JSTOR Biography Resource Center

Boxford Library Academic OneFile

Strategies

Fields A “field” is a place to put metadata –

information about the work Author, subject, etc.

Name some fields! Using Fields in Databases

• Contemporary Literary Criticism Artemis Literary Sources JSTOR

AND/OR/NOT

AND searches for two terms in combination with one another

Cats AND Dogs returns only results that include both words

OR searches for both termsCats OR Dogs returns any result that includes either

term

NOT eliminates one term from the searchCats NOT Dogs removes all results that include the

word “Dogs”

AND/OR/NOT in action

AND

ti:Beowulf AND au:Heaney

OR

ti: Beowulf AND (au:Heaney OR au:Bloom)

NOT

ti: Beowulf NOT su:dogs

Special Search Magic Truncation

Find possessive and plural terms Beowul*

Beowulf Beowulf's

Wildcards Track down alternate spellings B*owulf

Beowulf Baowulf

Full-Text Secrets Not everything will be online

Get the citation Inter-Library Loan Field Trips

Salem State Boston Public Library

Getting full-text Follow that record! Download in pdf format, if possible

Read, Read, Read! Working bibliography Take notes as you read Read each source multiple times

Questions!