English Internet Resources
This page offers links to a number of Internet sites that students of literature and English studies may find useful. As you explore the Internet and locate a useful site, please share the URL with your English professor, and we will create a link.
Keep in mind that the Internet can be a wild and untamed frontier of information. The sites we offer here are sponsored by recognized scholars and institutions. At least one English faculty member has reviewed each site and found it useful for reference or further study. When you browse the web on your own, try to determine the sponsor of each site and evaluate the credentials of the site's author(s). For additional information on using Internet sources, see the Department of English publication "Using the World Wide Web for Research in English." Your instructor can provide copies.
- Authors (alphabetical by author)
- Concordances
- Film
Jane Austen
http://elf.chaoscafe.com/austen/
Full text versions of Austen's novels, published by the English Literary Foundation
http://www.jasna.org/
This is the official site of the Jane Austen Society of North America. A recent addition to the site is a collection of book reviews from the society's newsletter.
http://www.goucher.edu/library/jausten/jabio.htm
This site contains a comprehensive list of critical and biographical works on Austen.
Robert Browning
http://www.emule.com/poetry/works.cgi?author=2
This site lists many poems by Browning. Through the list, you can access the full text of the poem. Some poems even have links to discussions and interpretations. There are also links to other poets and their major works.
http://www.library.utoronto.ca/utel/rp/authors/browning.html
This site also has a nice list of Browning's works. The poems also contain notes and allusions for certain lines. This, too, has links to other poets.
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Geoffrey Chaucer
http://www.luminarium.org/medlit/chaucer.htm
This site offers a comprehensive view on Geoffrey Chaucer. It included famous quotes, resources, links, and essays and artiles on his works. It also has solid explanations of each tale in Canterbury Tales.
http://www.courses.fas.harvard.edu/~chaucer/
This is a beautiful source that has more information on Chaucer and the time in which he wrote. There are also more sources on his famous works.
http://academics.vmi.edu/english/audio/Audio_Index.htm
This link takes you directly to an audio clip of the Prologue of The Canterbury Tales. The site also offers a number of valuable Chaucer resources. NOTE: If this link doesn't work for you, cut and paste it in your browser window.
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James Joyce
http://www.joycean.com/
In Bloom features biography information, essays, primary works, and links to other Joyce and Irish literature sites. This is a site that is easily navicable and interesting.
http://www.cohums.ohio-state.edu/english/organizations/ijjf/jrc/default.htm
The James Joyce Resource Center contains information on works, biography, and different critisicms on his writing. Their is also a Joycean timeline. There is a bibliography and an image section.
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John Milton
English majors in a Milton seminar at Meredith have prepared outlines of each of the twelve books of Paradise Lost, linked to illustrations by Gustave Dore and John Medina (thanks in part to the work of Prof. George Klawitter, St. Edward's University). http://www.meredith.edu/english/walton/milton/index.htm
Milton-L Home Page: http://www.richmond.edu/~creamer/milton/
Milton-L is an Internet discussion group devoted to the life, literature, and times of the poet John Milton. The group also sponsors this useful web site with links to other good Milton sites, including the scholarly journals Milton Quarterly and Milton Review. Included on the Milton-L site are audio recordings of a few Milton sonnets and of the arguments to the first nine books of Paradise Lost.
The Luminarium Milton page: http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/milton/
This is one of a host of literary pages available at this site. This page offers a good brief biography of Milton, plus links to electronic texts of Milton's sonnets, Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained, and several other works. Links are also provided to scholarly essays by professors and students. Check out the "additional resources" section for a dozen encyclopedia articles on Milton, a host of portraits of the poet, and other useful links.
Iconography of Paradise Lost: http://www.stedwards.edu/hum/klawitter/icon.htm
Don't miss this wonderful collection of visual images illustrating Milton's epic poem. Included in this collection prepared by Professor George Klawitter are illustrations of the major scenes and characters in Paradise Lost by Gustave Dore, John Martin, John Medina, and William Blake.
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William Shakespeare
In 2000 Dr. Garry Walton also compiled a list of all the versions of Shakespeare's plays now available on video and DVD, together with the names, phone numbers, and web addresses of suppliers.
Dr. Garry Walton has compiled this list of interesting and useful sites on Shakespeare's life, works and contexts: Shakespeare on the Web/
Michael Best's Introduction to Shakespeare's Life and Times
Prof. Best of the University of Victoria offers not only a two-semester online Shakespeare course but a full CD-ROM's worth of information on Shakespeare's world -- the history and politics, ideas and mores, art and music, stage and drama of the time. If you want to know more about marriage age or daily meals or the plague or sewage disposal or money or music or alcoholic beverages or jesters or court fashion, here is a great place to look.
Amy Ulen's Surfing with the Bard
This energetic collection provides "zones" for discussion, teacher resources, student guides, and reviews.
Terry Grey's Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet
This site offers a Shakespeare timeline and genealogy, a list of Shakespeare festivals, links to Web editions of the complete works, study guides and notes to a number of plays, and dozens and dozens of links to other Shakespeare sites on the Web. Well organized and thorough, it is an excellent place to start.
Renaissance: Elizabethan World
This site offers 70 pages of information about many Tudor/Elizabethan topics.
Shakespeare Illustrated
This beautiful project by Prof. Harry Rusche features paintings based on Shakespeare's plays, including some famous works by Blake, Delacroix, Fuseli, Millais and Rossetti.
Penn's Shakespeare Library
The English Renaissance in Context
Prof. Rebecca Bushnell introduces and annotates a wealth of wonderful resources -- including a group of important Renaissance texts, including Holinshed's Chronicles (a major source for Shakespeare's history plays) and several editions of King Lear. The texts are presented here in photographic facsimile for detailed study -- approximately one and a half times lifesize. This may be as close as most of us get to the rare quarto and folio editions.
Movie Review Query Engine
This may be the best source for movie reviews.
Internet Movie Database
This is the fullest, richest, most complete site for information about films - typically listing year of production and complete casts, and sometimes including box office stats, reviews, and other information.
Internet Broadway Data Base
Here is the site that Amy Kay Nickerson discovered, with information about the dates and theatres and casts of theatre performances, mostly on Broadway in New York. This site is parallel to the well known Internet Movie Data Base. Take a look!
Royal Shakespeare Company
For information about notable stage performances, this is the site I use the most. The RSC is the most famous Shakespearean company in the world. Most of the famous British actors of the 20th century worked in this company (including half the adult cast of the Harry Potter movies, for example -- Snape, Dumbledore, McGonagall, Voldemort, Lockhart, Petunia, Skeeter, Maxime, Fudge, ). The part of the site called "online resources" offers a wealth of information about Shakespeare's plays and esp. of important stage productions of them - complete with hundreds of production photos.
100 Best Shakespearean Performances
Here is someone's list of the best Shakespearean acting performances ever - including movies as well as stage productions and ranging from 1670 to 1993 (somehow the original Globe actors like Burbage were not talented enough to be included!). Like all "top 100" lists, this one is by turns interesting, useful, provocative, and maddening. Thanks to film, we can study 15 of these notable performances this semester. Want to know which play has the most nominations (an obvious choice), which single stage production had the most winning performances, which actor is most often cited, which is the oldest or the most recent performance to be praised? Check it out!
Shakespeare's Globe Theatre (rebuilt)
Shakespeare's Globe
This site offers detailed information about the original Globe of 1599 as well as its present London reincarnation. Links are provided to a Reading site about the Globe's neighbor, the Rose Theatre. Included are photographs, dimensions, drawings, diagrams, and even a "virtual tour" of the recently rebuilt Globe -- with photos supplying a 360-degree visual experience (www.rdg.ac.uk/globe/GlobeQTVR.html <http://www.rdg.ac.uk/globe/GlobeQTVR.html> )
Shakespeare Birthplace Trust
In addition to information for prospective tourists (hours, ticket prices), this official Stratford site supplies a brief biography, and information about 16th century Stratford life, including details about the houses and school associated with the Bard.
Queen Elizabeth I - appearance
This UK site offers a quick description of the Queen's appearance as captured in portraits, with a few of those paintings.
King James I
James VI of Scotland became James I ruling both Scotland and England after the death of Queen Elizabeth I in 1603. He ruled England when most of Shakespeare's tragedies were written and first performed. Shakespeare's company of actors claimed the patronage and protection of the king and were known as The King's Men. For more info about this powerful ruler, take a look at these web sites:
- http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/historic_figures/james_i_king.shtml
- http://www.luminarium.org/sevenlit/james/jamesbio.htm
- http://ise.uvic.ca/Library/SLT/history/jamessubj.html
- http://www.npg.org.uk/live/search/person.asp?LinkID=mp02390 (links to portraits of the king in the National Portrait Gallery in London)
Concordances
To search individual words in American poetry, try http://www.bartleby.com/ or http://www.concordance.com/
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Film
http://www.AFI.100movies.com
This site lists the 100 best American movies AFI came out with the summer before last, plus the 400 movies they chose from, plus a chance for visitors to vote.
http://us.imdb.com
These initials stand for Independent Movies Data Base, and it has reviews, plot summaries, best lines, and credits. You can search by individual titles and filmmakers.
http://www.mrqe.com
This is a great source for movies reviews, better than imdb.
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