Research Guides: Italian Studies: Literature and Culture

Bibliographic Databases

MLA International Bibliography (MLAIB) This link opens in a new window
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The MLA International Bibliography provides bibliographic records for books, book chapters, journal articles, and dissertations published in the fields of modern languages, literatures, folklore, and linguistics. Full text is available for some articles. The MLAIB covers items published from around 1920 to the present.
BiGLI Online This link opens in a new window
The Bibliografia Generale della Lingua e della Letteratura Italiana (BiGLI) is an annual index of scholarly monographs, journals, book chapters, and reviews in the field of Italian languages and literatures. Entries provide brief abstracts; publications described in reviews are also indexed, though not necessarily abstracted. Includes the entire contents of the print version of BiGLI (1993-2015), with coverage going back to 1991 and limited coverage to 1981 for titles described in reviews.
Arts and Humanities Citation Index (A&HCI) This link opens in a new window
This database indexes about 1,700 arts and humanities journals. Dates of coverage: 1975 to present.
Adjust settings to expand your searching to include the Social Sciences Citation Index, the Science Citation Index, the Book Citation Index, and others.
Oxford Bibliographies This link opens in a new window
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Oxford Bibliographies presents constantly updated articles that contain citations (with annotations) and commentaries for sources across the disciplines. Users can search topics and gather relevant journal article and book citations, online resources, data sources, and more.
Iter Bibliography This link opens in a new window
Comprised of secondary source material pertaining to the Middle Ages and Renaissance (400-1700). Citations for books and journal material (articles, reviews, review articles, bibliographies, catalogues, abstracts and discographies) are included, as are citations for dissertation abstracts and essays in books (including entries in conference proceedings, festschriften, encyclopedias and exhibition catalogues).
Medieval Bibliographies This link opens in a new window
The essential resource for finding articles in the field of Medieval Studies. Includes International Medieval Bibliography and Bibliographie de civilisation médiévale.

Other Bibliographic Resources

Libri e riviste d'Italia [Journal]
Call Number: eJournal
Publication Date: 2015-
Book reviews and the equivalent of Current Contents for periodicals in all fields, with occasional annotations
Italian books and periodicals [Journal]
Call Number: Z2345 .I89 Non-circulating
Publication Date: 1979-2003
English edition of Libri e riviste d'Italia.
Letteratura italiana, aggiornamento bibliografico [Journal]
Call Number: NYU Bobst Reference Collection PQ4001 .L46 Non-circulating
Publication Date: 1991-2012
Yearly index to over 150 Italian periodicals.
The Year's Work in Modern Language Studies [Journal]
Call Number: eJournal ; Offsite Reference PB1 .Y45 Non-circulating
Publication Date: 1931-
Yearly publication offering long essays summarizing the year's scholarship in the languages covered. Print version through 2009 also available in non-circulating offsite collection.
The Year's Work in Critical and Cultural Theory [Journal]
Call Number: eJournal
Publication Date: 1991-
Provides a narrative bibliography of work in the field of critical and cultural theory, recording significant debates and issues of interest in a broad field of research in the humanities and social sciences.

Literary Dictionaries and Histories

General Resources

Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory & Criticism This link opens in a new window
The Johns Hopkins Guide to Literary Theory and Criticism is a reference guide to literary theory. The Guide includes entries on critics and theorists, critical schools and movements, and the critical and theoretical innovations of specific countries and historical periods.

Literature Online (LION)
LION focuses primarily on Anglophone literature but nevertheless includes a number of bibliographic and reference resources that go beyond the English-speaking world or that serve Comparative Literature studies, including the Columbia Dictionary of Modern European Literature, the Columbia Dictionary of Modern Literary and Cultural Criticism, the Concise Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms, the Encyclopedia of Linguistics, the Encyclopedia of the Novel, the New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics, and the Routledge Encyclopedia of Narrative Theory

Literature Criticism Online This link opens in a new window
Literature Criticism Online includes the contents of several multidisciplinary series, including Contemporary Literary Criticism and Twentieth-Century Literary Criticism. The collection includes biographical essays and selected literary criticism for authors from the classical period to the present day.
Literature Resource Center This link opens in a new window
Literature Resource Center offers biographical and other background information for research on literary topics, authors, and their works. Its coverage includes all genres and disciplines, all time periods, and all regions of the world. Literature Resource Center's content comes from the Dictionary of Literary Biography, Contemporary Authors, Contemporary Literary Criticism, and more, including full text of selected poems, plays, and short stories.

Oxford Dictionary of Literary Terms (online) by Chris Baldick
Call Number: Reference PN41 .C67 2008 Non-circulating (print)
ISBN: 9780191783234
Publication Date: 2015
Clear, concise, often witty explanations of literary terms from abjection to zeugma.

Italian Literary History Resources (General)

The Cambridge History of Italian Literature by Peter Brand (Editor); Lino Pertile (Editor)
Call Number: PQ4038 .C35 1999
ISBN: 1139056174
Print and eBook.
A comprehensive survey of Italian literature from its earliest origins to the present. Leading scholars assess the work of writers including Dante, Petrarch and Boccaccio, the Renaissance humanists, Machiavelli, Ariosto and Tasso, pioneers and practitioners of commedia dell'arte and opera, and the contemporary novelists Calvino and Eco.
The Oxford Companion to Italian Literature by Peter Hainsworth (Editor); David Robey (Editor)
Call Number: PQ4006 .O84 2002
ISBN: 0198183321
Print and eBook
Covers early 13th century to 21st century, and offers a broad view of what constitutes literature, covering historical writing, travel writing, theatre, and philosophy as well as the novel, poetry, dialogues and critical theory.
Dictionary of Italian Literature by Peter E. Bondanella; Julia C. Bondanella (Editor)
Call Number: Offsite ; PQ4006 .D45
ISBN: 0313204217
Publication Date: 1979-02-01
Print
Dizionario critico della letteratura italiana by Vittore Branca
Call Number: Reference Collection ; PQ4057 .D59 1986 Non-circulating
Publication Date: 1986
Print
Long biocritical entries, as well as entries for literary terms and movements, etc., with substantial bibliographies.
Letteratura italiana by Alberto Asor Rosa
Call Number: PQ4037 .L457 1982
ISBN: 8806055143
Publication Date: 1982-1991
Print
Though dated, this remains a fundamental resource, with in-depth chapters spanning the whole of Italian literature and its social and cultural background. Includes a dictionary of literary biobibliography.