Build Context

Use the online databases on this page to find introductory overviews and background information, including:

• History: an overview of significant historical & cultural contexts as well as literary history

• Biographical: biographical key points that help you understand the work of literature

• Topic and Work Overviews: overview of literary style, thematic interests, and significance 

Sample Text:

from a Topic Overview in Gale Literary Sources of Alice Walker's "Everyday Use."

“Everyday Use” was published early in Alice Walker's writing career, appearing in her collection In Love and Trouble: Stories of Black Women in 1973. The work was enthusiastically reviewed upon publication, and “Everyday Use” has since been called by some critics the best of Walker's short stories. In letting a rural black woman with little education tell a story that affirms the value of her heritage, Walker articulates what has since become, as critic Barbara Christian notes, two central themes in her writing: "the importance of the quilt in her work . . . [and] the creation of African American Southern women as subjects in their own right."

"Overview: 'Everyday Use'." Short Stories for Students. Ed. Kathleen Wilson. Vol. 2. Detroit: Gale, 1997. Literature Resource Center. Web. 24 Nov. 2014.

• Why is this an overview? Because the author provides literary history and context, along with an overview of what critics had to say, without offering their own original analysis of the story.

Literary Criticism Collection in Reference

If you are in Holman Library, you can use the literary criticism books in the library.

• Use the Author Index at the back of each volume to see criticism across volumes and series.

• Search the Cumulative Title Index (separate, small, slick volume on the shelf) for your title to see all criticism within that particular series.

• If the article is an excerpt (not full text), use the One Search or InterLibrary Loan to track down the entire article.