Review:
"Scribner launches a new literature reference source with these volumes, accompaniments to its well-established American Writers and British Writers series. While those series focus on writers, the new ones concentrate on works. Each volume contains extensive essays on 20 literary classics in various genres, selected after researching the curriculum and consulting with professors... An essay of around 20 pages in length is devoted to each classic and enhanced by a chronology of events in the author?s life and a select bibliography of primary and secondary materials. Although most of the essays include background and a discussion of importance and influence as well as analysis, they do not adhere to a uniform structure. ... In contrast to other reference sources that take a title approach to literature, such as volumes in Gale?s For Students line and Salem?s Masterplots series, the essays in American Writers Classics and British Writers Classics use fairly academic language and generally assume familiarity with literary concepts and terms. These new series should prove to be very useful complements to the American and British Writers families of literary reference tools."
-- Booklist (July 2003) (Booklist 20030701)
"Each essay provides a historical overview of the work and its influences, a close reading of the work?s basic elements (e.g., imagery, allusions), and discusses the critical reception of the work at the time it was published as well as its importance of the time. This volume will be useful to student?s needing additional information on these popular works, for teachers preparing for their courses, and for graduate students preparing for comprehensive exams. High school and university libraries should consider its purchase, especially those that own other titles in the Scribner Writers Series."
-- ARBA (2003) (ARBA 20030101)
From Library Journal:
This new supplement in the "British Writers" series includes 25 articles (12,000-plus-words each) on authors, poets, and playwrights, most of whom came of age after World War II. A.A. Milne (of "Pooh" fame) and Patricia Highsmith (The Talented Mr. Ripley) are included, as is Eavan Boland, arguably Ireland's greatest living poet. As in previous volumes, the articles are written mostly by academics, with a few by freelance writers. The format is also the same: a biographical sketch, an overview of major works, and a bibliography of works by and about each author. A cumulative index to the entire "British Writers" set is included. This series (along with the Dictionary of Literary Biography) is essential for any collection serving researchers of British literary topics. The DLB covers many more writers than does "British Writers," but this set has the same high quality, is more selective, and is much less costly. Highly recommended for public and academic libraries.
-Peter A. Dollard, Alma Coll. Lib., MI
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.
"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.