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Much loved for its wit and wisdom since 1870, Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable takes you on a captivating adventure through its trademark blend of language, culture, myth and legend. As Susie Dent explains in the foreword, Brewer’s “is not a straightforward dictionary, nor is it an encyclopaedia. It is, in fact, unlike any other reference book that exists, anywhere.” This nineteenth edition encapsulates all the charm and wit that characterise its predecessors and maintains the standards of scholarship and eclecticism that have long been its hallmark.

Thoroughly updated with over 100 new and revised entries – think crowdsourcing, cyberpunk, iPad and mash-up – this unique resource is guaranteed to delight, entertain and inspire in the best Brewer’s tradition. Discover Brewer’s take on angels, heraldry, pub signs and recluses, and delve into the lexicographical world of the eggcorn. Whether you are a committed Brewerphile or a newcomer to its pages of fascinating entries, this edition will draw you in and keep you glued to its rich mix of eccentric nuggets.

Over 750 entries

The most authoritative and up-to-date dictionary of critical theory available, covering the Frankfurt school, cultural materialism, cultural studies, gender studies, film studies, literary theory, hermeneutics, historical materialism, Internet studies, and sociopolitical critical theory. It explains complex theoretical discourses, such as Marxism, psychoanalysis, structuralism, deconstruction, and postmodernism clearly and provides biographies of figures who have influenced the discipline, such as Deleuze and Foucault.

This new edition has been updated to extend coverage of diaspora, race, and postcolonial theory, and of queer and sexuality studies, ensuring that it remains invaluable for students of literary and cultural studies and anyone studying a humanities subject requiring a knowledge of theory.

This is an encyclopedic dictionary covering hundreds of important philosophical, literary, and political terms and concepts that defy easy--or any--translation from one language and culture to another. Drawn from more than a dozen languages, terms such as Dasein (German), pravda (Russian), saudade (Portuguese), and stato (Italian) are thoroughly examined in all their cross-linguistic and cross-cultural complexities. Spanning the classical, medieval, early modern, modern, and contemporary periods, these are terms that influence thinking across the humanities. The entries, written by more than 150 distinguished scholars, describe the origins and meanings of each term, the history and context of its usage, its translations into other languages, and its use in notable texts. The dictionary also includes essays on the special characteristics of particular languages--English, French, German, Greek, Italian, Portuguese, Russian, and Spanish.

Originally published in French, this one-of-a-kind reference work is now available in English, with new contributions from Judith Butler, Daniel Heller-Roazen, Ben Kafka, Kevin McLaughlin, Kenneth Reinhard, Stella Sandford, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Jane Tylus, Anthony Vidler, Susan Wolfson, Robert J. C. Young, and many more. The result is an invaluable reference for students, scholars, and general readers interested in the multilingual lives of some of our most influential words and ideas.

‘a superb act of homage at a critical moment in French literary fortunes’, Observer

This Companion is a new and completely reconceived work, rather than a revision of the 1959 Oxford Companion to French Literature. As the change in title implies, it presents an authoritative guide not only to ten centuries of literature produced in the territory now called France, but also to the rich literary output of other French‐speaking countries around the world. Written by an international team of specialists, entries cover individual authors and works from the troubadours to Césaire, and from La Princesse de Clèves to La Vie mode d'emploi. Substantial essay‐entries reflect the latest scholarship on topics such as chivalry, Occupation and Resistance in wartime France, scholasticism, the sciences, literary movements and genres, as well as opera, cinema, and press.

Adventurous and wide‐ranging, The New Oxford Companion to Literature in French is an indispensable and hugely enjoyable reference work for all scholars, students and general readers.

Written by an international team of scholars, the Oxford Companion to Chaucer provides a wealth of clear, up-to-date assessments on all aspects of Chaucer. Entries provide information on Chaucer's life and times, his works and the characteristics of them, his language and metre, his reading and the creative uses he made of it, and his major moral and literary themes. Extensive reference is also made to the development of critical opinion about his works over the centuries.

This Companion provides a fascinating and practical guide to Chaucer for readers at every level.

'a learned and totally addictive guide’ – The Times

Over 3,600 entries

The last thirty years have witnessed one of the most fertile periods in the history of children’s books—the flowering of imaginative writing and illustration, the Harry Potter phenomenon, the rise of young adult and crossover fiction, and books that tackle extraordinarily difficult subjects. The Companion provides an indispensable and fascinating reference guide to the world of children’s literature. It covers every genre from fairy tales to chapbooks; school stories to science fiction; comics to children’s hymns.

This is the first place to look for information about the authors, illustrators, printers, publishers, educationalists, and others who have influenced the development of children’s literature, as well as the stories and characters at its centre. Written both to entertain and to instruct, it is a reference work that no one interested in the world of children’s books should be without.

‘a volume for all seasons... indispensable’—Times Educational Supplement

The third edition of The Oxford Companion to Classical Literature is the complete and authoritative reference guide to the classical world and its literary heritage. It not only presents the reader with all the essential facts about the authors, tales, and characters from ancient myth and literature, but it also places these details in the wider contexts of the history and society of the Greek and Roman worlds. With an extensive web of cross-references and a useful chronological table and location maps (all of which have been brought fully up to date), this volume traces the development of literary forms and the classical allusions which have become embedded in our Western culture.

Extensively revised and updated since the second edition was published in 1989, the Companion acknowledges changes in the focus of scholarship over the last twenty years, through the incorporation of a far larger number of thematic entries such as medicine, friendship, science, freedom (concept of), and sexuality. These topical entries provide an excellent starting point to the exploration of their subjects in classical literature; after all, for many aspects of classical society the literature we have inherited is the primary (and sometimes the only) source material. Additions and changes have been made taking into account the advice of teachers and lecturers in Classics, ensuring that current educational needs are catered for.

In addition to newly covered topics, the Companion still plays to its traditional strengths, with extensive biographies of classical literary figures from Aeschylus to Zeno; entries on a multitude of literary styles from biography and rhetoric to lyric poetry and epic, encompassing everything in between; and character entries and plot summaries for the major figures and myths in the classical canon. It is the ideal guide for students in Classics, and for all who are passionate about the vast and varied literary tradition bequeathed to us from the classical world.

‘thoroughly researched, impartial, scholarly, wonderfully illustrated and enormous fun’ – The Independent on Sunday

Over 1,000 entries

This Companion is an authoritative reference source for the complex and captivating genre of the fairy tale. It provides full coverage of stories and characters, from Ali Baba, Aladdin, and Cinderella, to Hansel and Gretel, the Moomins, and Tom Thumb, along with the writers who wrote and reworked them, such as Hans Christian Andersen, Lewis Carroll, J. R. R. Tolkien, A. S. Byatt, and Gabriel García Márquez, and the artists who illustrated them, including Quentin Blake, Raymond Briggs, and Maurice Sendak. The Companion also examines related topics such as Disney, film, opera, science fiction, music, even advertising. Special survey articles explore the development of the fairy-tale tradition in individual countries, focusing particularly on the European and North American traditions.

Written by a team of over 70 specialist contributors from around the world, this is an essential companion for anyone interested in literature, film, or art, or for anyone who values the traditions of storytelling.

‘A wonderful treasure-house of information and insight’ – Dame Judi Dench

Over 3,200 entries

From the conjectured identity of the Dark Lady of the Sonnets to the misprints in the First Folio, from Shakespeare’s favourite figures of speech to the staging of Othello in South Africa, a team of 100 internationally renowned scholars provides a lucid, stimulating, and authoritative guide to Shakespeare’s plays and poems, and their interpretation around the world over the last four centuries. Now revised and updated to commemorate the 400^th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death, this much-loved Companion reflects developments and discoveries made in recent years as well as the performance, interpretation, and influence of Shakespeare’s works up to the present day.

From Haworth to Heathcliff and from Wildfell Hall to The Wide Sargasso Sea, The Oxford Companion to the Brontes provides comprehensive, authoritative, and up-to-date information on the lives, works, and afterlives of the three Bronte sisters. It is the first time so much information about the family has been gathered together in an accessible A-Z volume.

In-depth surveys of the Brontes’ lives and works and supplemented by entries on their friends and acquaintances, pets, literary and political heroes; on the places they knew and the places they imagined; on their letters, drawings, and paintings.

Extensive coverage of their juvenilia sheds light on their early imaginative worlds, while entries on the sequels and adaptations in film, theatre, and television convey the myriad ways their works live on.

'This dictionary's virtues and its plain-spokenness make it … as apt to the bedside table as to the desk: Dr Baldick is a Brewer for specialized tastes' – Times Literary Supplement

Over 1,200 entries

This bestselling dictionary provides clear and concise definitions of the most troublesome literary terms, from abjection to zeugma. Now expanded and in its fourth edition, it includes increased coverage of new terms from modern critical and theoretical movements, such as feminism, schools of American poetry, Spanish verse forms, life writing, and crime fiction.

It includes extensive coverage of traditional drama, versification, rhetoric, and literary history, as well as updated and extended advice on recommended further reading and a pronunciation guide to more than 200 terms. Completely revised and updated, this edition also features brand-new entries on terms such as distant reading, graphic novels, middle generation, and misery memoir. It is an essential reference tool for students of literature in any language.

In the past four decades the field of Asian American literary and cultural studies has grown enormously, expanding its areas of inquiry beyond the reflections on national identity and citizenship to encompass such issues as transnational and diasporic identities and communities; the workings of imperialism; the intersectionality of race, gender, and sexuality; and social justice/human rights in a global context. Led by Editor in Chief Josephine Lee and Associate Editors Floyd Cheung, Jennifer Ann Ho, Anita Mannur, and Cathy J. Schlund-Vials, this project is the largest and most comprehensive collection of scholarship on Asian American literature and culture to date. From Asian American literary classics to experimental theater, from K-pop to online gaming, the Oxford Encyclopedia of Asian American Literature and Culture guides both established scholars and readers new to this study through the extensive landscape of Asian American writing and cultural production. More than one hundred essays on varied historical periods, geographical locales, and artistic modes offer an extensive examination of racial representation and activism, interdisciplinary and comparative approaches to literary work, ethnic communities, space and place, transnational and transpacific flows, and genres such as speculative fiction, the detective novel, and melodrama. Along with literary works from the late-19th century to the 21st century, the Oxford Encyclopedia of Asian American Literature and Culture covers a wide-ranging selection of Asian American theatre, dance, music, visual arts, film, television, and media. With its illuminating and profound commentary on Asian American writing and artistic practice, the volumes survey the historical foundations of this rich field, showing the exciting new directions that currently drive the study of Asian American literary and cultural traditions.

2006 ALA/RUSA Best Reference

2006 Choice Outstanding Academic Title

2006 Booklist Editor's Choice

The Encyclopedia provides comprehensive coverage of literature from the Abbey Theatre to Israel Zangwill, covering the entire history of literature in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland in the major literary languages (Anglo-Saxon, English, Welsh, Scots, Irish, and Latin). It includes substantial accounts of individual authors (e.g., Spenser, Pope, Austen) and detailed histories of particular themes, movements, genres, and institutions, whose impact upon the writing or the reading of literature was significant (e.g., The Stationers' Company, the sonnet, the ‘School of Night, ’ or the Sublime).

2006 ALA/RUSA Best Reference

2006 Booklist Editor's Choice

2006 Library Journal Best Reference

Written by an international roster of more than 300 authors, the Encyclopedia comprehensively documents and interprets the books read by children throughout the world. With a global perspective that pays attention to significant international trends and the multicultural expansion of the field, it includes brief biographies of every major author and illustrator. Also included are feature essays on all genres of children's literature, individual works, and prominent trends and themes, as well as general essays on the traditions of children's literature in many countries throughout the world.

Latina/o literature is a growing field of study. It is both an emerging literature and a rich historical one that continues to be documented and uncovered in archival and personal collections. The Oxford Encyclopedia of Latina and Latino Literature offers a sweeping introduction to a variety of genres and themes in Latina/o literature from its Latin American origins in the precolonial period to contemporary texts and perspectives. The collection illustrates the historical, social, and political contexts in which successive generations of Latina and Latino authors have written, exploring the interrelationship between geography, national origin, race, gender, sexuality, and other cultural and ethnic identities.

Led by Editor in Chief Louis G. Mendoza and an editorial board of experts, this collection throws light not only on how Latina/o texts have evolved since the contact period, but also on how we have come to understand and conceptualize this work over the past three generations. From Chicana/o identity to Caribbean and Central American diasporic literature, from key figures in Latina/o letters to bilingual texts and graphic novels, the collection explores a variety of issues that are central to the 21st century's American experience, such as feminism, LGBTQA groups, indigeneity, environmental justice, social movements, migration, and US-Mexico borderlands. Each article paints a nuanced and in-depth portrait of Latina/o literary history in a dynamic, complex, and deeply engaging field of study that is at once highly popular, historical, and theoretical. One of the most extensive and detailed surveys of Latina/o literature to date, this encyclopedia shows the historical and cultural significance of this literary tradition in the American context, challenging readers to revisit conventional literary notions and expanding the borders of American literature.

Over 175 articles

The Oxford Encyclopedia of Literary Theory gives a comprehensive coverage of every aspect of literary theory, both traditional and contemporary. Led by Editor in Chief John Frow and Associate Editors Mark Byron, Pelagia Goulimari, Sean Pryor, and Julie Rak, the encyclopedia features around 175 essays written by a wide range of experts and distinguished scholars to explore the problems, the concepts, and the methodologies that arise when we discuss literary texts. They ask what systems of value go into making this category, separating “literary” from other kinds of texts or other language games; what a “text” is, what kinds of text there are, and who decides what it means to “read” a text: to understand it literally, to react to it emotionally, to look for broader structures of meaning, to understand it in relation to the context in which it was written or the contexts in which it was later understood; who “we” are who read; how reading relates to writing, and who or what the author of a text is and what authority they have over its reception; what background understandings shape our reading, how we acquire a knowledge of the norms and conventions that govern reading, how our class or our gender or our ethnicity form our understanding and the differences between our understandings; and whether some readings can be said to be better than others. Ranging across the analysis of formal concepts, of the institutions that support the production, dissemination, interpretation, and valuation of literary texts, of the identities of the real and textual persons who interact in the study of texts, and of the systematic methodologies of literary interpretation and understanding, the Encyclopedia is the most advanced and comprehensive collection of essays on literary theory ever published.

‘This is an impressive volume which is an indispensable reference work for anybody who takes an interest in literary translation’, Perspectives: Studies in Translatology

Written by eminent scholars from many countries, this Guide highlights the place of translation in our culture, encouraging awareness of the process of translating and making the translator more visible. It covers translations out of many languages, from Greek to Korean, Swahili to Russian. For some works (e.g. Virgil's Aeneid) which have been much translated, the discussion is historical and critical; with less familiar literatures, the Guide examines the extent to which translation has done justice to the range of work available. It contains entries on individual texts (such as the Thousand and One Nights), writers (Ibsen or Proust), genres (Chinese poetry), or national literature (for example, Hungarian). These entries are complemented by more substantial essays on theoretical questions, a pioneering outline of the history of translation into English, and discussions of the problems raised by specific types of text (for example, poetry or oral literature).

Recent years have seen a boom in translation studies, and this is the first comprehensive guide to this essential element of literature in English.

Written in a lucid, easy style, The Oxford Reader’s Companion to Dickens draws together an unparalleled diversity of information on one of our greatest writers: his life, his works, his reputation, and his cultural context.

Dr Paul Schlicke and his distinguished team of contributors have created a unique volume that offers a more extensive and comprehensive range of information than any other reference work on Dickens, indispensible for students and general readers alike.

‘informative, illuminating, and helpful … a remarkable achievement’ – Michael Billington, The Guardian

Over 1,000 entries

Provides essential information on the best-known, best-loved, and most important plays in world theatre. Each entry includes details of the title, author, date of writing, date of first performance, genre, setting, and composition of cast; there is also a summary of the play's plot, and a brief commentary. Genres covered include: burlesque, comedy, farce, historical drama, kabuki, masque, melodrama, morality play, mystery play, No, romantic comedy, tragicomedy, satire, and tragedy. The perfect guide for students and scholars of drama and literature, theatre professionals, and directors looking for plays for performance.

Through three editions over more than four decades, The Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics has built an unrivaled reputation as the most comprehensive and authoritative reference for students, scholars, and poets on all aspects of its subject: history, movements, genres, prosody, rhetorical devices, critical terms, and more. Now this landmark work has been thoroughly revised and updated for the twenty-first century. Compiled by an entirely new team of editors, the fourth edition--the first new edition in almost twenty years--reflects recent changes in literary and cultural studies, providing up-to-date coverage and giving greater attention to the international aspects of poetry, all while preserving the best of the previous volumes

At well over a million words and more than 1,000 entries, the Encyclopedia has unparalleled breadth and depth. Entries range in length from brief paragraphs to major essays of 15,000 words, offering a more thorough treatment-including expert synthesis and indispensable bibliographies-than conventional handbooks or dictionaries.

This is a work that no reader or writer of poetry will want to be without.