The qualities of a good literary researcher may not be fundamentally
different from those of their disciplinary ancestors--it
still takes creativity, diligence, and "sitzfleisch"--but the methods
by which these qualities get exercised have changed. These days, literary
researchers must be as comfortable at a computer as they are in a vast
library, equally expert in Boolean operators and Dewey decimals, and
have an intellect expansive enough to imagine how satellite imagery,
data mining techniques, and "social engineering" might all be used to
develop better understandings of, for example, Ghanaian plays, Maori
poetry, and the fiction of Dennis Cooper.
This site has been designed for literary researchers by literary researchers
to be an easy-to-use catalog of sources--print-based, digital, audio,
architectural, and human. They will help you find what you need in your quest to discover both established and innovative information about all manner of literary topics. Sometimes
our information will get you right to the source you need, and sometimes
it will help you learn how to go about finding that source yourself.
In either case, we hope you find this site useful and that you'll come
back soon to contribute some resources you've discovered yourself.
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