Drama and Dance

Facts and Background Information
Selected print and electronic encyclopedias, dictionaries, handbooks, etc.
Books
Locate items in the library catalog and other libraries.
Articles
Use indexes to search for articles in journals, proceedings, etc.
Primary Sources
Websites
Recommended academic, professional, and learned societies sites, and more.
Contact a Librarian

Below are a few major, frequently used sources for the study of Drama and Dance. See also the research guides to Literature (English & American, Romance, Asian, German & Russian, Classics), and General Humanities.

Please consult with a reference librarian for directions to many more sources in your topic. Internet resources require a Tufts I.D. number for off-campus access (authorized users statement).

 

Facts and Background Information     [back to top]

Cambridge Guide to Theatre
[PRINT. Tisch Reference PN2035 .C27]

McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of World Drama
[PRINT. Tisch Reference PN1625 .M3]

Theatre Backstage from A to Z
[PRINT. Tisch Reference N2035 .L6]

International Dictionary of Theatre
[PRINT. Tisch Reference PN2035 .I47 1992]

Brewer’s Theater: A Phrase and Fable Dictionary
[PRINT. Tisch Reference PN2035 .B74]

Oxford Companion to American Theatre
[PRINT Tisch Reference PN2220 .B6 1992]

Drama Dictionary
[PRINT. Tisch Reference PN1625 .H6]

Dance Encyclopedia
[PRINT. Tisch Reference GV1585 .C5]

Dance Words
[PRINT. Tisch Reference GV1585 .P47]

International Dictionary of Ballet
[PRINT. Tisch Reference GV1585 .I57]

Performing Arts: A Guide to the Reference Literature
[PRINT. Tisch Reference PN 1584 .S56]

Dictionary of Literary Biography
Provides nearly 10,000 biographical and critical essays on the lives, works, and careers of the world's most influential literary figures from all eras and genres.

Find Books     [back to top]

These databases use Library of Congress subject headings:

Library Catalog How To Use

Boston Library Consortium Catalogs How To Use

Worldcat How To Use
Catalog records from thousands of North American libraries.

Plays and monologues

Play Index
Play Index provides citations to over 30,000 plays written or translated into English, from Antiquity to the present, published in collections since 1949: one-act plays, pageants, plays in verse, radio and television plays, and classic drama. It includes links to the full text of plays if available on the web. Over 500 monologues are included. Searches can be limited by genre, age of audience, or the number and gender of roles. Annotations include plot summary, musical and scenery requirements, and number of sets. The index is updated continuously.

For other indexes to collections of plays and monologues, click here.

Best Plays of (year) and The Year Book of the Drama in America (Burns Mantle) 1899-
[PRINT. Tisch Book Stacks PN2266 .A2 B4]

For more on how to find books and search subjects in Drama and Dance, click here.

For more general information on how to find books, see Database Searching Tips (also available in PDF).

Find Articles     [back to top]

International Index to the Performing Arts How To Use
Indexes more than 200 scholarly and popular periodicals in dance, theater, film, and television, from 1998 to the present, with expanding retrospective coverage of some titles.

MLA International Bibliography 1963- How To Use
An international index to books and journals on the modern languages and literatures, including linguistics and folklore. Publications from 1921 to 1962 are covered in printed volumes at Tisch Reference Indexes [HUM] Z7006 .M64.

Times Literary Supplement Centenary Archive
Index and full text, 1902-1994. Names of contributors, anonymous through 1974, have been restored wherever possible.

World Shakespeare Bibliography Online
Provides annotated entries for all important books, articles, book reviews, dissertations, theatrical productions, reviews of productions, audiovisual materials, electronic media, and other scholarly and popular materials related to Shakespeare and published or produced since 1971.

Expanded Academic ASAP How To Use
Articles from more than 1,500 scholarly, trade, and general-interest publications, including national news and commentary. Coverage is from 1980 to current and is updated daily. Some full text is available.

Arts & Humanities Citation Index. Institute for Scientific Information, 1974- How To Use
Provides author, subject and citation access to journal articles and book reviews in the arts and humanities. Coverage from 1974. Part of Web of Science.

New York Times
For online, searchable text, use these two databases:

LexisNexis How To Use
From June 1, 1980 through current, full text of the Final New York City Edition; from January 1, 1969 - May 31, 1980 (abstracts). LexisNexis contains many American and foreign newspapers, and is a good source for current coverage of regional theater.

New York Times Historical Archive 1851-three years before current date How To Use
Includes full-text and full-image articles dating back to the first issue of the NYT in 1851; the collection includes digital reproductions of every page from every issue--cover to cover—in downloadable PDF(r) files.

Reviews and criticism

For indexes to critical writings in books, collections, and earlier periodicals, click here.

Electronic journals

Periodicals are listed in the library catalog. Holdings in all formats are unified in one record, and most entries for journals held in electronic format contain a hyperlink to the source; searches in the web-based catalog enable one to follow these links directly. A complete list of electronic journals is on the Tisch homepage under Electronic Journals.

Many humanities/social sciences journals held in digital format are parts of Project Muse or JSTOR. Although these databases include search engines for the journals they contain, the indexes listed above are the most comprehensive and authoritative sources for the literature of the discipline, and frequently link directly to our electronic journals.

For more on how to find articles, see Database Searching Tips (also available in PDF).

Primary Sources     [back to top]

ArchivesUSA How To Use
Information about primary source materials from U.S. manuscript repositories, with detailed indexes of manuscript and other special collections.

Early American Imprints 1639-1819
An online collection reproducing every extant book, pamphlet, and broadside published in America from 1639 to 1819 - the complete printed, non-serial source materials of American culture for the 17th and 18th centuries. Covers titles in the Evans and Shaw-Shoemaker bibliographies. Available also in microform: TISCH MICROFORMS F700.

Early English Books Online How To Use
Over 125,000 titles listed in Pollard & Redgrave's Short-Title Catalogue (1475-1640), Wing's Short-Title Catalogue (1641-1700), and the Thomason Tracts (1640-1661), comprising all known English language books from the beginning of printing to 1700. Years 1474-1640 are available also in microform, TISCH MICROFORMS R484.

Editions and Adaptations of Shakespeare How To Use
Eleven major editions from the First Folio to the Cambridge edition of 1863-6, 24 separate contemporary printings of individual plays, selected apocrypha and related works and more than 100 adaptations, sequels and burlesques from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries.

Websites     [back to top]

Tufts Department of Drama and Dance

Voice of the Shuttle: Drama, Theater, & Performance Art Studies

The Worldwide Wide Web Virtual Library: Theatre and Drama
A collection of multicultural and multilingual theatre links.

Playbill On-line

History of Costume

Costume Page

Didaskalia: Ancient Theatre Today
The latest developments in Greek and Roman drama, dance, and music as they are performed today. Includes full-text access to the journal of the same name.

College Theatre Guide

Association for Theatre in Higher Education

Complete Works of William Shakespeare

Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet

For more on how to find and evaluate websites, see How to Evaluate Web Sources.

Contact a Librarian     [back to top]

Christopher Barbour. Contact for questions about library collections.
Chao Chen . Contact for reference questions and instruction requests.

Now at Tisch

Check out the podcast series, Tisch Talks!

Did you know that Tisch Library has an audio magazine, Tisch Talks? Featured topics include interviews with visiting authors, using the library catalog, and finding book reviews. Check out this series, or better yet, set your RSS reader to subscribe to new editions automatically.

Featured Resource

Eighteenth-Century Collections Online

ECCO aims to deliver every significant English-language and foreign-language title printed in Great Britain during the Eighteenth Century...

Did You Know?