FINDING BOOKS OF AND ABOUT POETRY

To find books of criticism about poetry, Browse Alphabetically by Topic in the library's catalog.  To find books about a particular poet, type the poet's name, surname first, in the search box.  For example, to find books about Walt Whitman, type "Whitman, Walt" and click the Browse button.  Books about all aspects of Whitman's works will now appear, organized by various subheadings under his name, which is the main heading.  The heading "Whitman, Walt, 1819-1892. Leaves of grass" will list the books that focus specifically on his poetry collection, Leaves of Grass, but other headings (such as "Whitman, Walt, 1819-1892 -- Criticism and interpretation") will list books that provide extensive discussion of his poetry, also. 

If you are looking for books about a topic (not a person), search in the library catalog and type in words that occur to you to describe your topic.  If the first terms you type do not give you the results you want, try typing various ways of describing your topic.  Then, once you find some books that look like what you want, click on their titles and then click on the "Subjects" links that appear in the full records for those books.  You will now probably find even more books on the same topic.  (For example, if you type "devotional poetry,"  you will find some books, but clicking on the Subject heading "Religious poetry"  will reveal additional books to choose from.)

To find the books of poetry written by a poet, do an author search in the library catalog.  Type the author's name with the surname first (for example -- Whitman, Walt) to see a list of all the books that we have written by that author.

Your results will probably include printed books that can be found in the library building, as well as electronic books that can be read online.  You can tell which books are printed books because a location in the building is indicated as part of its record.  E-books have no physical location indicated, and the words "Electronic" and "eBook" usually appear at the bottom of the record in your list of results.  Click on the links above those words to read the book online.

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