Abrams, Meyer Howard. A Glossary of Literary Terms. 6th ed. Fort Worth, TX;

Montreal: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich College Publishers, ca. 1993.

[One of the better sources for information on literary terms and critical schools. Somewhat conservative, but well worth owning].

Fowler, Roger, ed. A Dictionary of Modern Critical Terms. Rev. ed. London and

New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1987.

[Originally designed as a"cutting-edge" critical dictionary, it is already somewhat out of date, but is still a good source of information].

Harmon, William. A Handbook to Literature. 8th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ:

Prentice Hall, ca. 2000.

[Based upon a now ancient handbook by William FlintThrall and Addison Hibbard, and later further revised by C. Hugh Holman, this work has been through numerous edition, and remains a standard reference source for literary terms and ideas].

Watson, George, et al., eds. The New Cambridge Bibliography of English Literature. 5
        Vols. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1969-77.

[Contains comprehensive bibliographies of works by and about most of the major (and a number of minor) figures in English literary history, as well as sections on such important topics as philosophy, science, religion, etc. The lists of secondary sources are now so out-of-date as to be all but useless, and coverage of women writers and minor authors is poor. Nonetheless, this is not a bad reference to consult if you wish to get an overall sense of your author's oeuvre. It is also a very useful resource for locating relevant and useful primary source materials that may relate to your subject, as for example works of theology, philosophy, history, anthologies, etc. Volume 2 covers the period 1660-1800. A new and revised edition of this work will be appearing, we are told, shortly; volume 4 (1800-1900) is available now].

Drabble, Margaret. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 6th ed. Oxford;
          Toronto: Oxford UP, 2000.

Oxford English Dictionary. Ed. J. A. Simpson and E. S. C. Weinger. 2nd ed. 20 Vols.

Oxford: Clarendon, 1989.

[This is by far the most comprehensive dictionary ever produced, for any language. Contains detailed etymologies, notes on usage, comprehensive lists of variant meanings, and examples cited from many of the most important works in the English language. It can also yield some useful surprises and information about unexpected subjects. If you want detailed information about a word's meaning or history, or should you wish to cite a dictionary definition in a research paper, this is the dictionary that you should consult. It is now also available on CD-ROM, and online; be warned, however, that some computer versions are much abridged].

Stephen, Sir Leslie, et al., eds. Dictionary of National Biography . . .to 1901. 1885-

1901. 65 Vols. London : Oxford University Press ; H. Milford, 1921-1922.

[The standard biographical dictionary for the British Isles, originally published in 65 volumes between 1885 and 1901. Although numerous supplements have been published to include more modern figures, it is badly out-of-date (a new edition is currently in the works). It is nonetheless an excellent place to find biographical information on authors and historical figures; in some cases (i.e., especially obscure writers), the DNB may provide the only biographical information available].

Dictionary of Literary Biography. 248 Vols. Detroit : Gale Research Co., 1978-2001.

[A really excellent resource which can, however, be a little difficult to employ. Use the cumulative index at the back of the last (i.e., most recent) volume to locate your author. Entries include essays on the author in question, interesting illustrations, and very useful bibliographies. Coverage of minor authors is quite good, although by no means complete. Highly recommended.]

Scott-Kilvert, Ian, gen. ed. British Writers. 8 vols. New York : Scribner, ca. 1979-1984.

[A sometimes useful resource: volumes 2 and 3 cover Restoration and eighteenth-century writers.]

Todd, Janet, ed. British Women Writers: A Critical Reference Guide. New York :

Continuum, 1989.

[A very useful reference guide by one of the foremost authorities on women writers in our period. The British edition is entitled Dictionary of British Women Writers]

—. A Dictionary of British and American Women Writers, 1660-1800. London :

Methuen, 1985.

[Another reference work by Janet Todd; see above]

Literary Histories

Sutherland, James R. English Literature of the Late Seventeenth Century. Oxford

History of English Literature 6. Oxford : Clarendon Press, 1969.

[Part of the 13 volume Oxford History of English Literature. Like most of its companion volumes, this is by one of the foremost authorities of its day; it provides some very useful context and general discussion, but is now increasingly out-of-date in its approach and scope. Coverage of minor authors ranges from reasonable to poor; coverage of women writers is dreadful. It can be rather annoying in its tendency to assume that its readers already possess a fair amount of background knowledge.]

Dobrée, Bonamy. English Literature in the Early Eighteenth Century, 1700-1740.

Oxford History of English Literature 7. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1959.

[Another of the Oxford Histories of English Literature; see Sutherland's volume, above.]

Butt, John E. The Mid-Eighteenth Century. Edited and completed by Geoffrey

Carnall. Oxford History of English Literature 8. Oxford : Clarendon Press; New York: Oxford University Press, 1979.

[Another of the Oxford Histories of English Literature; see Sutherland's volume, above.]

Parfitt, George. English Poetry of the Seventeenth Century. Longman Literature in the

English Series. London and New York: Longman, 1985.

[Another interesting guide with much to say about the Restoration period. It contains some very useful information on genres. A second edition was published in 1992].

Renwick, William L. English Literature, 1789-1815. Oxford History of English

Literature 9. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1963.

[Another of the Oxford Histories of English Literature; see Sutherland's volume, above. This volume does cover the last decade of the eighteenth-century, but its focus is overwhelmingly upon the early Romantics.]

Rothstein, Eric. Restoration and Eighteenth-Century Poetry, 1660-1780. The Routledge

History of English Poetry 3. Boston, London, and Henley: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1981.

[An extremely interesting and useful guide to the poetry of our period. Rothstein's structuralist approach "dates" this work somewhat, but it is, fortunately, a most profitable critical methodology in Rothstein's hands. Not, however, very good on women writers.]

Barrell, John. English Literature in History, 1730-80: An Equal, Wide Survey. London:

Hutchinson, 1983.

[ A very worthwhile survey of the latter end of our period by one of the foremost Marxist critics today.]

Brewer, John. The Pleasures of the Imagination: English Culture in the Eighteenth

Century. London: HarperCollins, 1997.

[A thick and richly illustrated study of many aspects of the culture of the period.]

Brown, Laura.. Fables of Modernity: Literature and Culture in the English Eighteenth

Century. Ithaca: Cornell UP, 2001.

DeMaria, Robert Jr., ed. British Literature 1640-1789: A Critical Reader. Malden:

Blackwell, 1999.

[Intended as a companion volume to DeMaria's anthology of the late seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century literature, this work contains essays by a number of well-known critics, including David Norbrook on Milton, Catherine Gallagher on Behn's Oroonoko, Claude Rawson on Rochester, Howard Weinbrot on Dryden's "Anne Killigrew" ode, and Carol Barash on Anne Finch. Other essays examine Defoe's The Shortest Way, Swift's Tale of a Tub, Pope's Rape of the Lock, the work of Johnson, Hume, and Burke, and poems of Leapor, Gray, Cowper, and Chatterton.]

Greene, Donald Johnson. The Age of Exuberance; Backgrounds to Eighteenth-

Century English Literature. New York : Random House, 1970.

[Once the standard undergraduate introduction to the period, this well-written overview is still an enjoyable read, despite its silence on a number of issues of interest today]

Gregory, Jeremy. The Longman Companion to Britain in the Eighteenth Century,

1688-1820. London; New York: Longman, 2000.

[A solid and useful reference book for eighteenth-century background]

Parry, Graham. The Seventeenth Century: The Intellectual and Cultural Context of

English Literature, 1603-1700. London; New York: Longman, 1989.

Sambrook, James. The Eighteenth Century —The Intellectual and Cultural Context of

English Literature, 1700-1789. London; New York: Longman, 1986.

[A second edition was published in 1993. This useful reference includes chapters on religion, philosophy, politics, historical writing, aesthetics, visual arts (including painting and landscape gardening), and cultural influences, including the classical world, gothicism and orientalism. It also includes discussions of exploration, perception, and imagination.]

Simmons, Eva, ed. Augustan Literature: A guide to Restoration and Eighteenth

Century Literature, 1660-1789. London: Bloomsbury, 1994.

Zwicker, Steven N., ed. The Cambridge Companion to English Literature, 1650-1740.

Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1998.

[This volume is comprised of essays by a variety of well-known critics on a diverse range of subjects. The focus of the first six essays is thematic, with discussions of satire, gender, "difference," the theatre, music, lyric forms, and classical models. The remaining texts focus on individual authors, including Milton, Marvell, Dryden, Rochester, Behn, Swift, Defoe, Mary Astell, Locke, Pope and Montagu.]