Library Research Guides: ENG 387: Virginia Woolf: From Victorian to Modern: Home

Virginia Woolf, by Unknown. Harvard Theater Collection, Houghton Library, Harvard University, Public Domain

Selected Web Resources

Virginia Woolf: Art, Life & Vision
Based on an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery (UK), the site includes photographs and a room-by-room audio tour by the exhibition curator.
Lifestyle and Legacy of the Bloomsbury Group
An overview of the Bloomsbury group, with photographs, letters, artwork, and other material from the Tate’s archive.
Woolf Online
A rich digital archive of materials relatedTo the Lighthouse, including various drafts, proofs, and editions of Woolf's work as well as a wealth of contextual material.
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Includes letters, diary entries, essays, photographs, newspaper articles, reviews, etc. The site can be difficult to navigate, but the Quick Links can provide a good starting point.

Search Tip: Google Books!

A search in Google Books can be a great way to identify books that may be relevant to your research. Since a Google Books search looks for your search terms within the full text of the millions of digitized books in its database, it may find books that don't turn up in a search of our library catalog or SuperSearch, which search a much smaller amount of information. In most cases, you won't be able to access the full text of the book through Google Books, but once you have a relevant title, you can check our library catalog to see if we have it. If we don't, you can request it through Interlibrary Loan.

Key Databases for Scholarly Sources

It's always a good idea to try searching in more than one database. Even when there is considerable overlap in content, the different search capabilities and features of each database will help you find different sources.

MLA International Bibliography This link opens in a new window
This is the most comprehensive database for finding scholarly articles, books, and book chapters on literature and related fields, from the latest scholarship back to the 1880s. Use the "Find it! @Wellesley" link to get the full text. If we don't have it, you can request it through Interlibrary Loan.
JSTOR This link opens in a new window
This database contains scholarly journal articles in many disciplines, including language and literature. For most journals, it does not contain articles from the most recent 3-5 years.
Project MUSE This link opens in a new window
Here you'll find articles from selected scholarly journals in the humanities and social sciences from the last 5-10 years, with some coverage back to the 1990s.

MLA International Bibliography Search Tips

To find sources on Woolf in MLA, search for Woolf as a Primary Subject Author:

Then you can add other terms to narrow your search by topic:

Look at the Subjects that come up under the citations. They can provide you with additional ideas for search terms.

You can use the filters to limit your search by source type (articles, books, etc.), date, etc.

For more tips on database searching, see our Search Tips: Truncation and Boolean Searching guide.

Selected Books on Woolf & Her Works

The Cambridge Companion to Virginia Woolf (e-book) by Susan Sellers (Editor)
Publication Date: 2010
(Also available in print in the Clapp Library, PR 6045.O72 Z5655 2010)
Virginia Woolf A to Z: A Comprehensive Reference for Students, Teachers and Common Readers to Her Life, Work, and Critical Reception by Mark Hussey
Call Number: Clapp Reference PR6045.O72 Z729 1995
Virginia Woolf: The Critical Heritage (e-book) by Robin Majumdar & Allen McLaurin (Editors)
Publication Date: 1975
A collection of contemporaneous reviews of all of Woolf's works.

Find additional books (as well as videos and music) in the Library catalog

Try your own search by keyword, title, author, or subject!

Search the Library Catalog

Use Google Scholar to Find Newer Research

When you find an article or book that is useful for your research, you probably know to consult its bibliography or reference list to find other potentially relevant sources. In this way, you're tracing the scholarly conversation backwards in time. But you can also trace citations forward to find newer scholarship that cites the source you have in hand.

Go to Google Scholar
Do a search for your source
Click "Cited By" to see works in Google Scholar that have cited your source

You can also search within the results to find only sources that mention a particular work or other keyword.

You can also try Google Scholar's "Related articles" link, which uses Google's proprietary algorithms to pull up similar articles.

Key Biographies

Virginia Woolf by Hermione Lee
Call Number: Clapp PR 6045.O72 Z774 1997
Biography
Virginia Woolf: A Biography by Quentin Bell
Call Number: Clapp PR 6045.O72 Z545

Oxford Dictionary of National Biography This link opens in a new window
A good place to find out more about persons in Woolf's circle and beyond. Covers biographies of British figures worldwide and throughout history.

Streaming Videos

Virginia Woolf: A Concise Biography
This overview of Virginia Woolf's life and work from the Famous Authors series introduces the writer's upper-class family and their many literary friends who cultivated her talents and later inspired her characters.
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The film takes a look at Woolf's response to the early loss of her mother and sister and her mental health struggles thereafter. Woolf secured an important position in London literary circles, became part of the famous Bloomsbury group, and proceeded to write innovative fiction that changed the way women were represented in literature. (35 minutes)
Virginia Woolf’s 'Mrs Dalloway'
Professor Elaine Showalter explores modernity, consciousness, gender and time in Virginia Woolf’s ground-breaking work, 'Mrs Dalloway'.
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The film is shot around the streets of London, as well as at the British Library and at Gordon Square in Bloomsbury where Virginia and her siblings lived in the early 20th century. The film offers rare glimpses into the manuscript draft of the novel. From the British Library's Discovering Literature series.

Karen Storz

Email Me

Contact:

781-283-3372
kstorz@wellesley.edu

Research & Instruction Librarian
Office: Clapp Library 218B

Subjects: Africana Studies, American Studies, Cinema & Media Studies, Cognitive & Linguistic Sciences, Comparative Literature, East Asian Languages & Cultures, East Asian Studies, English, German & German Cultural Studies, Italian Studies, Latin American Studies, Portuguese, Russian & Russian Area Studies, Spanish

ENG 387: Virginia Woolf: From Victorian to Modern: Home

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