Comparative Literature Research Guide
Primary Sources
Primary sources include creative works, firsthand reportage, and personal papers such as letters, diaries, and accounts. Besides literary works in the circulating collection, primary source material in the Du Bois Library of interest to Comparative Literature scholars can be found in the Special Collections and University Archives and Microforms areas of W.E. B. Du Bois Library.
Special Collections and University Archives
Literary Works
Manuscripts and rare publications of twentieth-century writers like William Morris, Robert Francis, Leokadia Rowinski, Archibald MacLeish, William Butler Yeats; Latin American authors in Spanish and English; Roberta Uno's Asian American Women Playwrights' Scripts Collection; and African-American writers of the Broadside Press.
Papers of Individual Writers
Papers of African-American leaders and educators W.E.B. DuBois and Horace Mann Bond; poets Robert Francis, Madeleine DeFrees, and Wallace Stevens; novelist and social critic Harvey Swados; expatriate actor, director, musician, and writer Gordon Heath; Sidney Finkelstein; and reporter and Boston Globe editor Charles Whipple.
Papers of Scholars and University Educators
Papers of Thomas Copeland (editor, papers of Edmund Burke), Morris Golden (professor, scholar of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century writers Henry Fielding, Samuel Richardson, Charles Dickens, and Henry James), Maxwell Goldberg (author, English professor and founding member of the College English Association), and Karl Wallace (professor, rhetorician and President of the Speech Association of America)
Poetry Audiotapes
Tapes from two series produced in 1954 by the University of Massachusetts Literary Society, featuring New England poets Archibald MacLeish, Wallace Stevens, Richard Wilbur, John Ciardi, e.e. cummings, Richard Eberhart, Peter Viereck, Robert Francis, Robert Frost, David Morton, and Robert Hillyer reading their own poems, and authors and critics Robert Penn Warren, W.H. Auden, Richard Blackmur, John Dos Passos, John Steinbeck, and William Faulkner.
Phonological Research
Interviewers' records and phonological analyses generated during research and field work for the Linguistic Atlas of New England (1939-1943).
University Archives
Materials of interest include student publications, books from University of Massachusetts Press, and publications and records of academic departments and individual faculty and staff
Microforms
Microforms are newspapers, periodicals, book collections and other publications printed in miniature on film in rolls (microfilm) or sheets (microfiche), or on opaque cards (microcards or microprints). Microform reproduction preserves fragile or rare material and saves space. The Periodicals/Microforms Room of the W.E.B. Du Bois Library has special microform reader-printers for all microform formats. Some sets of potential interest to Comparative Literature scholars:
American Prose Fiction Series, 1774-1900 (Microfilm A 97)
Collection of novels, short stories, romances, and other fictional works written by Americans from the colonial period to 1900. Guide and index at Ref. Z 1231 F4 V5
British Periodicals in the Creative Arts (Microfilm A 1164)
Periodicals dealing with the fine arts, architecture, archaeology, drama, and music published in Britain between the 1770s and the early 1900s. UMass owns the complete collection of 71 periodicals in 224 reels. Indexed by British periodicals in the creative arts: an index to the microfilm collection. Ref. Z5937 .B75
Early English Books 1475-1640 (Microfilm A1162; also available as a database )
Collection currently contains 1,979 reels of microfilm and nearly 25,000 books. Includes most of the titles listed in Pollard & Redgrave's Short-title Catalogue of Books Printed in England, Scotland, & Ireland and of English Books Printed Abroad, 1475-1640, as well as some not listed there. Titles are listed by reel number in Early English books, 1475-1640: A Guide to the Microfilm Collection Ref. Z 2002 U573; cross-indexed by STC (Short Title Catalogue) number in: Early English Books, 1475-1640: cross index to reels. Ref. Z 2002 U574.
Early English Books 1641-1700 (Microfilm A1163)
This ongoing collection currently contains around 2,629 reels of microfilm and nearly 62,000 books. Indexed by: Accessing Early English Books, 1641-1700. Ref. Z 2002 U586 1981+ and Early English Books, 1641-1700. Ref. Z 2002 U587
English Literary Periodicals (Microfilm A88)
Microfilm copies of 233 periodicals published during the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. UMass owns the complete collection of 969 reels. For a guide to the microfilm collection see: Accessing English Literary Periodicals: A Guide to the Microfilm Collection. Ref. Z 692 S5 U56 1981
Herstory (Microform Storage 2337)
Archive of early women's rights and women's history periodicals. For guide, see Women's History Collection Index. Ref. Z 6944 W6 W6.
Newspapers from the Russian Revolutionary Era (Microform Storage A936)
Covers the period 1850-1917. Guide and index at Ref. Z 2495 N39.
Underground Newspaper Collection (Microfilm A265)
464 U.S. and international newspapers filmed as they were produced by the "Underground Newspaper Syndicate" of Bell and Howell, later UMI. See index and table of contents at Ref Z 6514 U5 U49. (Supplement this with the database AltPress Watch .) |
