English Literature
Discover the best information, whether you’re a new English Literature student starting your first assignment, or delving into a research project.
Popular pages on the Library website
Three key actions for getting started
Finding information for your assessments
Developing strong information searching skills saves time and brings results. Finding Information Skills covers everything you need for academic searching. Take the Finding Information Skills assessment for a personalised action plan.
Reading Lists
These are set up by your tutors to guide you to good quality, relevant and useful materials to help you with your studies. They are a great starting point before doing your own research - find out more about your Reading Lists.
Library Search
Library Search can make your academic life easier by helping you find a range of reliable and trustworthy sources for your work. It contains a wealth of information to help you make the most of your studies, including books/eBooks, journals/eJournals, articles, databases, and more.
Using Library Search may feel daunting at first, but don't worry, we have a range of guides on how to find relevant resources.
Databases
Databases are searchable collections of good quality, academic material, particularly journal articles. They can be small subject specific or large collections covering a wide range of subject areas. Most databases provide access to full-text items.
| A series of guides, written by experts, providing introductions to major writers, artists, philosophers, topics, and periods. | |
| More than 46,000 books covering all academic subjects. | |
| Provides scripts for many modern and classic plays from a huge range of authors. It also includes books providing analysis and criticism of plays and playwrights, as well as a small collection videos of specific productions | |
| Brings together the different Gale literary databases in one easy place to search. | |
| A great place to start a search on most subjects, providing access to both books and journal articles. | |
| A collection of ProQuest databases relating to literature to language studies. | |
| More than 500,000 works of poetry, drama, and prose from the eighth century to the present day. Plus, scholarly articles, reviews and books, and a collection of key reference works. | |
| More than 60,000 biographies and 11,000 images of significant, influential or notorious figures who have shaped British history. |
Digital Archives
Digital Archives predominantly contain digitised primary sources. These are original documents and objects that give first-hand accounts of a topic or event and are created by people who had a direct connection with the topic or event. These can be government, company or personal papers, newspapers, books or magazines, or films or works of art.
| Access to more than 250 archive collections, providing digital copies of original documents and other materials. | |
| Users can search for productions, listen to audio extracts of plays, watch interviews with playwrights and browse the teaching resources. | |
| A rich source of original material on many aspects of society, culture and politics from the 17th to the 20th century. | |
| Contains digitised copies of nearly half a million books published from the late 15th century through to the 19th century. | |
| A weekly review of the literature of the day. |
Video
Videos offer a dynamic way to absorb information. They often present complex ideas in an easily digestible format.
| More than 2.2 million radio and TV programmes that have been broadcast in the UK. You can search for, and watch, anything already in the archive, as well as making use of the TV scheduling service. This allows you to record TV and radio programmes that are scheduled to be broadcast over the next seven days. | |
| Provides videos of more than 300 classic, contemporary and international theatre productions. There are more than 230 interviews exploring the theatre-making process as well as essays, documentaries, lectures, and study guides relating to all aspects of theatre. | |
| Provides access to a large, curated catalogue of more than 30,000 educational documentaries and classic films from leading producers. | |
| Drawing on ten years of NT Live broadcasts, alongside high-quality archive recordings never previously seen outside the NT's Archive, the National Theatre Collections provide more than 60 filmed performances. |
Newspapers & Magazines
Newspapers are a great source for reviews and comment on film, television, theatre, and performances.
The Library gives students and researchers access to wide-range of Newspapers.
You can also find a wide range of magazines in the Library and some digital magazines via Library Search, such as:
| Access to an archive of reviews, interviews, and features on popular music artists by writers from the most influential music magazines. Content goes back to 1960. | |
| A selection of articles from digital archives of more than 50 different publications, each addressing the issues of Black Lives Matter with one section dedicated to music. | |
| A bimonthly print magazine and website. The magazine focuses on commercial creativity, covering design, advertising, photography, branding, digital products, film, and gaming. | |
| A bi-monthly British lifestyle magazine founded in 1991. It covers music, fashion, film, art, and literature. | |
| A British music magazine publishing out of London, which has been issued monthly in print since 1982. |
LinkedIn Learning
LinkedIn Learning offers more than 9,000 professionally produced online courses covering a wide range of technical, creative and professional skills.
Always use our institutional link to log in – you will need your University email address and password. The first time that you log in, you will be taken through a setup process to discover courses tailored to your interests.
Discover more in our video: Using LinkedIn Learning at Salford.
Print Books
You can borrow print books from the Library. The location details below are a guide, it is best to use Library Search for exact location of items:
| Classmark | Subject area |
| 800 | Writing and literature |
| 821 | Poetry |
| 823 | Novels |
| 830 | European Literature |
Study better
University assessments
Whilst studying at Salford you will need to complete a range of assessments. We provide a range of guidance on how to approach the different assessment types you may come across.
Referencing
We provide eLearning, written guides, and an extensive list of referencing examples.
Skills A-Z
We have developed eLearning over a wide range of subjects for you to develop your academic skills at home and in your own time.
Workshops
We offer online and face-to-face workshops to help you develop your academic skills. These engaging, interactive sessions cover a wide range of topics which take place throughout the year, so check up on the list regularly.
Click on a workshop title to book onto the session via Advantage. If a session has no remaining spaces, sign up to the waiting list in case a space becomes free!
One to one appointments
You can book a one to one appointment with your Academic Support Team to discuss finding information, academic and writing skills, or digital support.
Follow the link below, choose your school and what you'd like support with, then select your chosen time slot and book on through Advantage.
Can't find what you need?
Contact the Academic Support Team using this form. You can also see who's who in the Team.