Simply stated, a biography is written about a person. Many times throughout your academic career and beyond, you will need to find information about a person. Depending the amount and type of information, you might use a monograph, a general encyclopedia, a biographical dictionary, or a biographical encyclopedia. All of these sources can offer information about a person, but each has something different to offer.
After reading about these sources you will be able to decide which books will be helpful in locating information about a variety of individuals. As an example, some of these sources only contain information on deceased individuals while others refer only to living Americans. Some sources will offer several pages of information, while others offer only a paragraph or two.
Authors may be found in the above sources; however, the two following sources will probably have more to offer to the student of a literature class.
Many of you will also find that it is necessary to find critical information on the works of a variety of authors. The following reference works offer an excellent source of reviews on a number of books.
Don't forget; these are only a few of the sources you might use. Periodicals can also be good sources on critical reviews of books.
On to Assignment 4!
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