LibGuides: Philosophy 475: Zombie Apocalypse!: Novel Analysis

Novel Analysis

Literature Analysis - Scholarly Sources
After you're done with your film, pick up a book! This guide contains all of the databases you'll need to do an analysis of your novel.

MLA International Bibliography (1926 - current)
Comprehensive coverage of modern languages and literature, including folklore. Linguistics and language materials range from history and theory of linguistics, comparative linguistics, semantics, stylistics, and syntax to translation. Other topics include literary theory and criticism, dramatic arts (film, radio, television, theater), and book history. Search Tips
GALE Literature
Gale Literary Sources integrates full-text literary content with metadata and subject indexing across various Gale literature products. Access points include authors and their works, literary movements and genres, with selected full-texts of literary works, journal articles, literature criticism, reviews, biographical information, and overviews.
Project Muse
Scholarly projects demand reliable content. Project MUSE is your trusted source for the highest quality books and journals in the humanities and social sciences from over 200 of the world’s most distinguished university presses and scholarly societies.

Like films, your novel might not come up on the first try - if you are looking for the novel Cell by Stephen King and just type in cell, you might get a lot of works about cellular biology! So try combining that with the author name, keywords/themes of the novel, etc. You could also add a term like "novel" but that might be interpreted as "new."
You might want to do a search first to make sure that there is enough out there on your novel. If not, you can take the approach of looking up specific themes, characters, plot points, and then make your own analysis based on what you have read. You could then use searches like zombies AND consumerism or zombies AND technology to read books and articles that address these themes more generally, and then use them in your analysis.
Reading a brief book review is helpful before diving into the scholarly literature, as it will help you to pick out the major characters, plot points, and themes of the novel. You can use these as keywords or subject headings and it will help you consider how to structure your critical analysis, or what to focus on.