Dictionary Of Literary Characters - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0550101276 ISBN 13: 9780550101273

Publisher: Chambers Harrap Pub Ltd, 2004

Synopsis

This new edition of Chambers Dictionary of Literary Characters has been revised and expanded to bring it thoroughly up to date. More than 6,500 entries provide a guide to the wealth of characters created by writers in English ? from the Wife of Bath to Bertie Wooster, from Tom Sawyer to Harry Potter. New features include concise biographies of the authors, entertaining essays on such topics as ?The Detective in Fiction” and ?The Characters of Charles Dickens,” and an appendix of literary awards.

About this title

About the Author

This internationally renowned reference publisher continues its celebrated tradition of excellence into the present day with such informative and authoritative works as the Chambers Crossword Dictionary, Chambers Encyclopedia, Chambers Biographical Dictionary and the all-new Chambers Dictionary of Quotations.

Chambers is based in Edinburgh, as it always has been, and employs editors with a wide range of skills on dictionaries and other titles for a variety of users, including students and teachers of English as a foreign or second language. As well as the core business of publishing dictionaries and thesauruses, Chambers also publishes a range of titles on grammar and usage, single-volume reference titles on science, history, biography and quotations, as well as titles for Scrabble® and crosswords.

Reviews

Grade 7 Up–An overly ambitious and not particularly informative book. It's understandable that the list of characters is limited to English-language works, but why include entries for "Galore, Pussy" and "Lanark," but not Mike Hammer or Christopher Robin? Nick Charles is here, but not his equally inebriated wife, Nora. The articles are brief (usually less than 100 words) and include the titles of the work(s) the character appeared in, author, and a description of the character's major traits (e.g., "uncouth herdsman," "aging spinster," "shabby," "ironic sharp-tongued teacher," "eloquent spider," etc.); important physical traits; relationships; and an occasional word or two of psychological analysis. The abundance of entries (more than 6500) and wide range of sources (novels, plays, short stories, and poetry from Chaucer to Toni Morrison) are comparable to William S. Walsh's Heroes and Heroines of Fiction (Gale, 1966). However, libraries owning William Rose Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia (HarperCollins, 1965) or Anne Skillion's The New York Public Library Literature Companion (S & S, 2001) will probably have all the essential characters covered. Though this volume includes eight short essays on character types and an index of literary awards (Nobel, Booker, Pulitzer for fiction), it still seems a bit like the ignored Pooh–stuffed with fluff. Is there really a need for a reference book that tells readers about Rima (the girlfriend of Lanark) but ignores the iconic Hazel Motes of Flannery O'Connor's Wise Blood?–Herman Sutter, Saint Agnes Academy, Houston, TX
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Edition details

• Publisher: Chambers Harrap Pub Ltd
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0550101276
• ISBN 13: 9780550101273
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 818
• Editor: Chambers, McGovern Una