LibGuides: French Language and Literature: Get Started

Background Information

The following resources provide background information on a wide range of topics. Start here to get a sense of the scholarly context surrounding the work, person, or issue you're researching, and get ideas for ways to narrow or focus your topic.

Cambridge Companion to French Literature
Essays by leading specialists offering insights into French literary culture, its genres, movements, themes, and historic turning points, including the cultural and linguistic challenges of today's multi-ethnic France.
Cambridge Companion to the French Novel
Discusses the novel in French over the past two centuries. Includes a chronology and guide to further reading. Also available in print: Stacks PQ671. C296 1997
New Oxford Companion to Literature in French
Brief entries on authors, works, and several extended essays on literary topics.
Voice of the Shuttle
Collection of links to websites useful for the study of French literature.

Go-To Research Resources

MLA International Bibliography
The major index of literary, linguistic and folklore scholarship. Covers all languages and literatures except classical Greek and Latin.
JSTOR
Full text archive of scholarly journals and primary sources in various disciplines. As of August 2024, the interdisciplinary library of images once known as Artstor has been completely incorporated within the JSTOR platform. Artstor images will appear in all searches, or you can use the Browse Images function.
CAIRN
French language journals articles and magazines in the social sciences and humanities. Also includes full text access to selected French language reference works.