Tagged Literature
Surrealism and Gender
Written by Lewis Shaw, who conducted extensive research in the Art Department as part of a Friends Select School Senior Internship Project. During the extended fever dream which we all refer to as COVID quarantine, I picked up a love of…
Create Something New During National Sewing Month
September is National Sewing Month and a great opportunity to create something new this year for everyone on your D.I.Y gift-giving list. Both the Art and Literature and Science and Wellness departments at Parkway Central Library have…
¡Celebremos la Fiesta del Libro en Español!
The love for the Spanish language and culture can transcend frontiers! The stories, poems and illustrations of the books can reflect personal narratives that touch our collective unconsciousness. A team of talented community…
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Uncovering the Real James Bond in the Rare Book Department
From Sean Connery to Daniel Craig, the intrepid agent of the British Secret Intelligence Service—James Bond, designated Agent 007—has epitomized masculine cool. Everyone knows how he likes his vodka martinis. Everyone knows…
Celebrating Pakistan's Independence Day with Music, Film, and Literature!
Jashn-e-Azadi Mubarak! Happy Independence Day! This past Saturday, August 14, was Pakistan’s Independence Day. Formed in 1947, Pakistan celebrated 74 years of its independence and freedom from British colonialism and the formation…
Summer Reading with Dena!
Yes, it’s that time of the year again, to head to the beach (or a heavily air conditioned reading nook) and dive into some fun reading! Here are some new and newish books that are perfect for giving yourself a mental vacation:…
Central Senior Services Joins Moore College of Art to Fight Social Isolation During Pandemic
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has studied the impact of loneliness and social isolation on American seniors and the results are deeply disturbing. Extensive studies of the subject reveal that social isolation of…
10 Great Reads from the Holmesburg Library Book Club
Since 2019, the Holmesburg Library's Book Club has met biweekly to discuss great modern literature, nineteenth-century classics, and historical nonfiction, to name just a few genres. Not even the pandemic could stop the book club…
Creative Writing: Discovering Your Inner Voice
I always wanted to explore creative writing! It’s fascinating to understand what tools and mechanisms writers use to craft a story or a poem. Creating with words is an amazing and fun experience! The pandemic gave me the…
Making Her Mark Spotlight: Poetry and Movement Building
by Suzanna Urminska and Sam Perduta Our words carry power—whether as balm or as burnish, our words have the power to come together to form poetry that recalls and reconnects a range of human experiences both personal and…
Newest Episode of "Book Feast" Invites Women to the Table
Coinciding with Women’s History Month, the newest episode of Book Feast uses the luncheon in Virginia Woolf ’s proto-feminist essay A Room of One’s Own (1929) to discuss women’s legacy in literature. The…
Let Culinary Explorations of Literature Nourish You with Book Feast!
Have you ever thought about why we use the same vocabulary to describe consuming food and consuming knowledge? How we’re hungry for the truth, devour a good book, and digest information? Intellectual nourishment has been so…
Story Search from Special Collections: An Interview by Hannah Cho
Hannah Cho is a University of Pennsylvania Work-Study student from Davis, CA. During the Fall semester, she studied, recorded, and edited the Story Search podcasts remotely from South Korea. I’ve always been more of a talker…
Healing Verse Philly: a Project from the Poet Laureate
Through the challenges of 2020, one of the abiding sources of relief for many of us has been poetry. More people than ever are looking to the written word for strength, wisdom, and comfort. Even before the pandemic struck, Trapeta B.…
Monday Poets Turns 25! View Ephemera from Over the Years
The Literature Department at Parkway Central Library is celebrating the 25th year of our flagship program, Monday Poets ! Over the years, the department has hosted poets from all over the country, and has always made it their mission to…
In Appreciation of Octavia Butler
That’s all anybody can do right now. Live. Hold out. Survive. I don’t know whether good times are coming back again. But I know that won’t matter if we don’t survive these times. ― Octavia E. Butler, Parable of…
If You Liked Jane Eyre...
...then why not check out these digital titles from the Free Library, specially curated for fans of this beloved English novel? On this day in 1816, Charlotte Brontë was born in Thornton, England. The third of six children, she and…
Spotlight on Special Collections: When Dickens Met Poe
This blog post is in honor of Charles Dickens' birthday. The prolific Victorian author of "epic stories" like Oliver Twist and David Copperfield , was born on Portsea Island off England's south-central…
Mark Gatiss Visits The Rosenbach to Film New Dracula Documentary
The Rosenbach was delighted to have writer, actor, and director Mark Gatiss visit in June to shoot scenes for his In Search of Dracula documentary, which was just released on the BBC. Along with Stephen Moffat , Gatiss created a new…
Hands-On History Wraps Up 2019 With Charles Dickens... and Introduces a New Line-Up For 2020
What do Charles Dickens, cuneiform tablets, and James Bond have in common? The answer is Hands-on History at the Free Library, which wraps up its inaugural year with a holiday program on Saturday, December 14 at 2:00 p.m.,…
Amor Towles | The Lincoln Highway
DETAILS TO COME The bestselling author of A Gentleman in Moscow and Rules of Civility and master of absorbing, sophisticated fiction returns with a stylish and propulsive novel set in 1950s America In June, 1954,…
Virtual First Chapter Friday
Looking for your next read? CCD librarians will read the first chapter of a book they really enjoy! Be sure to then place your hold so you can read them too! (The videos will be posted to Facebook.) This program is intended for…
Five Christmases with Charles Dickens
The Rare Book Department of the Free Library of Philadelphia invites you to celebrate Five Christmases with Dickens. While Charles Dickens did not invent Christmas his works influenced how Victorians were to celebrate the…
Virtual First Chapter Friday
Looking for your next read? CCD librarians will read the first chapter of a book they really enjoy! Be sure to then place your hold so you can read them too! (The videos will be posted to Facebook.) This program is intended for…
Virtual First Chapter Friday
Looking for your next read? CCD librarians will read the first chapter of a book they really enjoy! Be sure to then place your hold so you can read them too! (The videos will be posted to Facebook.) This program is intended for…
VIRTUAL - Tracy K. Smith | Lucille Clifton’s Generations: A Memoir
REGISTER In conversation with Trapeta B. Mayson Chronicling African American family life and women through 14 celebrated poetry collections, Lucille Clifton won the National Book Award and the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, and is the only…
VIRTUAL - Uwem Akpan | New York, My Village with Kirstin Valdez Quade | Five Wounds
REGISTER Uwem Akpan ’s Say You’re One of Them , “a startling debut collection” ( The New York Times ) of short stories was a Wall Street Journal #1 bestseller, the 2009 Oprah Book Club Selection, and…
Virtual First Chapter Friday
Looking for your next read? CCD librarians will read the first chapter of a book they really enjoy! Be sure to then place your hold so you can read them too! (The videos will be posted to Facebook.) This program is intended for…
IN-PERSON | Glory Edim | On Girlhood: 15 Stories from the Well-Read Black Girl Library
REGISTER REQUIRED IN ADVANCE In conversation with Christine Kendall, author of Riding Chance , nominated for a NAACP Image Award, and The True Definition of Neva Beane Glory Edim is the creator of Well-Read Black Girl, a book club,…
Poetry in Translation
Take pleasure in reading poets from other languages and cultures.
Poetry - Novels in Verse
Poetry with special appeal for tweens and teens.
Poetry - Great Contemporary Poetry
Selections from the Literature Department.
NewsBank Hot Topics
Trending news and hot topics for your next assignment! Hot topics covers Current Events, Business & Economics, Civics, Government, & Politics, Social Issues, Science, Technology & Health, Sports, Arts & Literature, and People in the News.
LitFinder *
Discover literature content from more than 150,000 full-text poems, 840,000 poem citations and excerpts, 7,100 full-text short stories and novels, 3,800 full-text essays published in the 16th-20th centuries, 2,400 full-text speeches, and…
Literature Criticism Online
This extensive compilation of literary commentary represents a range of modern and historical views on authors and their works across regions, eras, and genres. Covers Children’s, Classical, Contemporary, Drama, Poetry, Shakespearean,…
Gale OneFile | High School Edition (formerly InfoTrac Student Edition) *
High school students will have access to age-appropriate content from magazines, journals, newspapers, reference books, and engaging multi-media covering a wide range of subjects, from science, history, and literature to political…
Gale Literary Sources (formerly Artemis)
Cross-search all of Gale’s literature databases from a single digital space to find biographies, primary sources, contextual reference, and criticism. Includes Dictionary of Literary Biography, Something About the Author, LitFinder,…
Gale in Context | Middle School (formerly Research in Context) *
Discover reliable and trusted information on a variety of topics to support middle school student research for government, U.S and world history, geography, literature, sciences, and social issues. Research In Context offers…
Gale in Context | Elementary (formerly Kids InfoBits) *
Elementary students in kindergarten through grade five will find age-appropriate content covering a broad range of educational topics such as animals, arts, geography, health, literature, people, social studies, technology, etc. Kids…
Books & Authors *
Discover fiction and non-fiction books that match your interests! Books and Authors (powered by Gale's popular What Do I Read Next? series) is for readers from every level of reading proficiency and enables users to explore the endless…
America's Historical Imprints
Explore the nation’s past in unprecedented ways. Includes books, pamphlets, broadsides and other scarce printed material, centuries of American history, literature, culture, and daily life, and extensive indexing and full bibliographic…
Academic OneFile *
More than 18,000 peer-reviewed journals and more than 9,200 in full text Full text of The Economist ranging from 1988 to the present, with no embargo Full text of The New York Times from 1985 to present, updated daily Full text of The…
Asali Solomon | The Days of Afrekete
In conversation with Nicole Dennis-Benn Asali Solomon is the author of Disgruntled , “a smart, philosophical, coming-of-age” ( San Francisco Chronicle ) novel about the double-binds of race in late 1980s Philadelphia. Her other work…
Anthony Doerr | Cloud Cuckoo Land
In conversation with John Freeman Anthony Doerr won the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for All the Light We Cannot See , “a beautiful, daring, heartbreaking, oddly joyous novel” (Seattle Times) about a blind French girl and a German boy…
Honorée Fanonne Jeffers | The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois with Kevin Young | Stones
Honorée Fanonne Jeffers is the author of five poetry collections, including The Gospel of Barbecue , Red Clay Suite , and T he Age of Phillis , which was longlisted for the 2020 National Book Award for Poetry and won a 2021 NAACP Image…
Hilma Wolitzer | Today a Woman Went Mad in the Supermarket
In conversation with Meg Wolitzer An “American literary treasure” ( The Boston Globe ), Hilma Wolitzer is the author of the novels In the Flesh , The Doctor’s Daughter , and Ending , which served as the inspiration for Bob Fosse’s…
Richard Powers | Bewilderment
In conversation with Andrew Ervin A “genuine artist … who can render the intricate dazzle of it all and at the same time plumb its philosophical implications” ( Esquire ), Richard Powers won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for The…
Alice McDermott | What About the Baby? Some Thoughts on the Art of Fiction
In conversation with Danielle Evans Pulling the delicate threads of “fear and vulnerability, joy and passion, the capacity for love and pain and grief” ( The Washington Post ), Alice McDermott’s fictional narratives explore intersecting…
Colm Tóibín | The Magician
Colm Tóibín’s “audacious, profound, and wonderfully intelligent” ( The Guardian ) work includes an impressive list of novels, short stories, essays, plays, poetry, and criticism. His novels The Blackwater Lightship , The Master , and…
Sandra Cisneros | Martita, I Remember You/Martita, te recuerdo
In conversation with Luis J. Rodríguez "Not only a gifted writer, but an absolutely essential one" ( The New York Times Book Review ), Sandra Cisneros explores the themes of place, identity, and working-class culture in her novels,…
Carole Hopson | A Pair of Wings: A Novel Inspired by Pioneer Aviatrix Bessie Coleman
In conversation with Lorene Cary, author of the memoirs Ladysitting and Black Ice , three novels, and a book for young readers. She teaches at University of Pennsylvania and has written a one-act opera of Ladysitting and a play, …
Rita Dove | Playlist for the Apocalypse: Poems
In conversation Trapeta Mayson, Philadelphia Poet Laureate Former United States Poet Laureate Rita Dove won the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for Thomas and Beulah , a semi-fictional collection of verse that examined the lives of her…
Omar El Akkad | What Strange Paradise
Omar El Akkad is the author of American War , a “poignant and horrifying” ( Washington Post ) dystopian novel that imagines a future civil war born from the U.S.’s current destructive policies and impulses. It was an international…
William di Canzio | Alec
In conversation with Wendy Moffat, Professor of English and Curley Chair of Global Education at Dickinson College and author of the prize-winning biography, A Great Unrecorded History: A New Life of E.M. Forster A professor in the…
Joshua Cohen | The Netanyahus with Rivka Galchen | Everyone Knows Your Mother Is a Witch
Joshua Cohen ’s acclaimed novels include Moving Kings , Witz , and Book of Numbers , “a fascinating look at the dark heart of the Web” and “one of the best novels ever written about the Internet” ( Rolling Stone ). One of Granta ’s Best…
Emily Rapp Black | Frida Kahlo and My Left Leg
In conversation with Katie Ford, author of If You Have to Go and three previous collections of poems. Ford is the recipient of a Lannan Literary Fellowship and she teaches at the University of California, Riverside. Bestselling…
Kiese Laymon | Long Division
In conversation with Imani Perry Kiese Laymon’s Heavy , a coming-of-age memoir that begins in Jackson, Mississippi, was named a Best Book of 2018 by the New York Times , NPR, and the Washington Post , among other media outlets. The…
Michael Punke | Ridgeline
In conversation with Christina Baker Kline, author of the #1 New York Times bestseller Orphan Train , A Piece of the World , and The Exiles Michael Punke is the author of the #1 New York Times bestseller The Revenant , “a superb revenge…
Maggie O’Farrell | Hamnet: A Novel of the Plague
In conversation with Nicole Galland, historical novelist and author of Master of the Revels and creator of Shakespeare for the Masses With a “gift for combining intricate, engrossing plots with full-bodied characterizations” (…
Kevin Kwan | Sex and Vanity
In conversation with Nydia Han, Consumer Investigative Reporter and co-anchor of 6ABC Action News Sunday mornings Kevin Kwan is the author of Crazy Rich Asians , "a lively, generous story of shallow extravagance and human devotion” (…
Kaitlyn Greenidge | Libertie
In conversation with Salamishah Tillet, the Henry Rutgers Professor of African American Studies and Creative Writing and author of In Search of The Color Purple: The Story of an American Masterpiece Kaitlyn Greenidge is the author of…
Caleb Azumah Nelson | Open Water
In conversation with Megha Majumdar, bestselling author of A Burning British–-Ghanaian writer Caleb Azumah Nelson’s debut novel Open Water is, “an intense, elegant” ( Guardian ) tale of two young Black British artists who find love as…
Bestsellers
Find out about the latest bestsellers from many well known resources.