Reference Reviews

Doug’s Student Reference Room

Magill’s Survey of World Literature, edited by Steven G. Kellman. Revised edition, 6 vol., 2918 p. Pasadena, CA: Salem Press, 2009. ISBN: 978-1-58765-431-2. $499.

This set is a revised version of the outstanding Marshall Cavendish offering from 1993 (with a 1995 supplement). 87 authors have been added to this collection, including Douglas Adams, Roberto Bolaño, Roddy Doyle, Laura Esquivel, Seamus Heaney, Haruki Murakami and yes, J.K. Rowling. Many original essays were revised and updated to include recent developments, including new works or changes in critical or popular standing. 380 authors from more than 60 countries range from ancient masters like Homer and Li Po to modern scribes like Isabel Allende and Arundhati Roy and include poets, playwrights and novelists. The main text of each entry features a biographical overview, an analysis that discusses the author’s style and thematic focus, a review of the author’s major works—including thumbnail photos of relevant book covers-- and a summary of the author’s overall contributions to literature. Entries also include a bibliography of works both by and about the author. The entries are written with a high school audience in mind; the entry on Jorge Luis Borges, for example, places the author squarely in the postmodern tradition and describes the essential features of this movement. Likewise, this entry describes Borges’s “fascination with dreams and magic and with their power to lend a mythic quality to reality,” noting this Latin American literary tradition without bogging readers down with the term “magic realism.” The analyses of major works provide brief plot summaries and a critical look at the important literary elements present in the work, affording young students early exposure to literary criticism well within their reach. Each entry also includes a set of discussion questions that could lead to deeper inquiry into the author and his works. The last volume includes a glossary of literary terms, a category list of authors by genre, a geographical list and author and title indexes. This collection examines the work of an ample cross-section of writers from different eras and regions of the world and would act as a perfect starting point for individual or group study of one or more authors. Highly recommended for high school and community college libraries.