World Authors, 1990-1995 - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0824209567 ISBN 13: 9780824209568

Publisher: Hw Wilson Co, 1999

Synopsis

Representing a broad range of ethnic diversity, these in-depth profiles present fascinating accounts of lives and careers, the circumstances under which works were produced, and their literary significance. Each profile also includes critical evaluation,

About this title

From Booklist

Since the publication of World Authors 1950-1970, H. W. Wilson has continued the series in volumes covering five years at a time. This is the latest installment, offering articles on more than 300 poets, dramatists, essayists, novelists, and other writers who have received acclaim during this time period. Although the format used is similar to that of previous volumes (a picture, the biographical article, suggested reading, and selected works), the articles, ranging in length from two to four pages, now begin with a short overview of the author's work. Approximately one-third of the entrants supplied brief autobiographical pieces specifically for this book. These add depth to the signed sketches written by the staff contributors. There is diversity in both the ethnic and writing backgrounds of the authors represented. Nonfiction writers, such as Michael Eric Dyson, Susan Faludi, and Cornel West are included, as are novelists Edwidge Dantica, Duong Thu Huong, Laura Esquivel, and Terry McMillan. A welcome addition to the series first begun in 1942, this volume provides introductions to many of the prominent writers of the day. A must for most collections.The summer Olympics take place this September in Sydney, Australia, and 18 months later, the winter Olympics come to Salt Lake City. These major sports festivals will bring a multitude of sports--some more common than others--to televisions, sports pages, and the minds of Americans. A good collection of reference tools can help libraries serve the information needs of their sports-minded users, both casual and serious. Presented here is a selection of recent titles, as well as Web sites, that provide facts and figures both for sports in general and for specific pursuits. Several general sources cover a variety of sports and can answer most basic sports questions. In recent years, two sports media giants have published very helpful almanacs. The ESPN Informa tion Please Sports Almanac and the Sports Illustrated Sports Almanac preview the coming year in sports, review the year just past, and provide tables of lists of winners, championships, and holders of records. These same media are present on the World Wide Web, where up-to-the-minute information can be found at ESPN.com and CNNSI.com (for CNN and Sports Illustrated ). Another useful general sports site is SportServer . It includes television schedules and a "this day in sports" feature and provides access to information about almost any organized sport.A comprehensive approach is also taken by Encyclopedia of World Sport: From Ancient Times to the Present. This three-volume set contains 250 entries that cover 300 sports and numerous related concepts such as aggression, drugs and drug testing, and the environment.The contesting of sport requires some agreed-upon rules. Several sources exist for individual sports rules; other sources cover multiple sports in one volume. Book of Rules: A Visual Guide to the Laws of Every Commonly Played Sport and Game handles 30 sports, describing what it takes to play (equipment, uniforms, playing surface, players, and officials), how to play and win, salient skills, and detailed rules (usually abridged from an authoritative source). Sports Rules On File does the same thing for 40 sports played in high schools. Another possibility is Sports Rules Book , which covers 54 sports and acknowledges variations as played by younger athletes and women athletes.Libraries may also want to consider providing access to the rules that govern high-school and college sports in the areas that they serve. Publications that describe the official rules for NCAA sports can be ordered on the association's Web site, NCAA Online. Libraries should also pay particular attention to sports that are peculiar to or popular in their regions: for example, snow skiing near mountain resorts, surfboarding near the ocean.What's a Hoosier? A Nittany Lion? The Name Game describes the origins of names of sports teams in U.S and Canadian major league sports, college teams, and select minor league teams. Alas, the book is too old to include an explanation of those interesting Women's National Basketball Association team names. Other words that carry meaning in (and out of) the sporting arena are collected in Sports Quotations: Maxims, Quips, and Pro nouncements for Writers and Fans, which organizes 2,800 quotes into 27 categories. Plenty of fodder here for writers, coaches, and others trying to track down the sources of sports quotations.Playoffs and tournaments often cap the end of a sporting season. Those organizing their own championships will be aided by Orga nizing Successful Tournaments, which provides draw sheets, schedules, and other tools for conducting single- and double-elimination and round-robin tournaments. Need to set up a double-elimination tournament for 11 teams? Fill out your brackets here.Other useful titles that cover a variety of sports include Ency clopedia of Sports Science, explaining scientific and physiological aspects of how sports are played. A Who's Who of Sports Champions: Their Stories and Records provides basic information about 2,200 athletes important in U.S and Canadian sports.For coverage of women's role in sports, consult Victoria Sherrow's Encyclopedia of Women and Sports , which covers specific (mostly U.S.) athletes and concepts such as sexism and pregnancy. Janet Woolum's Outstanding Women Athletes covers 86 athletes and 10 championship teams. The Women's Sports Encyclopedia is more almanac-like, with biographical and historical sketches and vocabulary lists arranged by sport.USA Today: The Complete Four Sport Stadium Guide tells you how to get to arenas and fields where the major league sports are contested. Additionally, it tells you how to get the best or last-minute seats, quirks of the venues, what food to get from the concession stands, and milestones and histories of the pertinent teams. The summer and winter Olympics are celebrated in alternating even-numbered years. A few months prior to each game comes David Wallechinsky's Complete Book of the Summer Olympics or Com plete Book of the Winter Olympics. These books list the top eight finishers in each and every Olympic event ever contested, along with their times, scores, or distances. Wallechinsky also relates trivia and drama that accompany most of the contests. Another winner is Whitaker's Olympic Almanack , with entries covering sports, host cities, and superlatives such as Heaviest and Youngest .The major-league sports of baseball, football, basketball, and ice hockey have large fan bases and, accordingly, a large amount of reference literature. This means that libraries have many resources from which to choose to answer trivia questions and to settle barroom bets. Baseball is the oldest of these sports. Record keeping goes back to 1876, requiring lengthy works to present comprehensive statistics. One of the best of these is The Baseball Encyclopedia , providing complete records of major league baseball, including coverage of the Negro Leagues and the All-American Girls Professional Baseball. The eleventh edition is due in October 2000. A viable alternative is Total Baseball , which contains complete records for anyone who ever played an inning of the game, information about ballparks, rosters of all-star games and Hall of Fame members, as well as essays about African Americans and women in baseball, baseball in the Caribbean and Japan, college baseball, legal aspects, collecting, and other topics.The editors of Total Baseball are responsible for Baseball: The Bio graphical Encyclopedia, which contains 2,000 short biographical sketches that flesh out the statistics of the most important baseball players as well as umpires, team owners, executives, and broadcasters who have influenced the game. The New Dickson Baseball Dictionary defines 7,000 of the sport's technical, slang, and historically significant words. Other nice features are a thesaurus and a key to abbreviations found in baseball box scores. For the latest information, go to the Web site MajorLeagueBase ball.com, as well as the general sports Web sites.Basketball, too, has its share of reference sources. The Official NBA Basketball Encyclopedia has been the standard for information about the National Basketball Association for several years. It contains historical narratives, time lines, rules, directories of Hall of Fame members, All-Star team members, the annual player draft, and perspectives on the game as it is played worldwide. The bulk of the volume is given to a directory of past and present players in the league, with a season-by-season statistical picture of their play in the league. For season-by-season team records, see the Official NBA Guide from Sporting News . For the current season's results, log onto NBA.com, the league's Web site.The Official WBNA Guide and Register , also published by the journal Sporting News, covers the recently formed Women's National Basketball Association. This annual volume includes biographies and statistics of the league's players and histories and statistics of its teams. Further coverage can be found at the league's Web site, WNBA.com . A closer look at the sport's better players is provided by The Biographical History of Basketball . For American-style football, consider the linebacker-sized Total Football II. It contains the requisite statistics of players and a list of the 300 best-ever players, as well as narratives about game strategy and the impact of the game on our culture. The NFL's Web site is NFL .com .Total Hockey covers not only major league hockey, but also provides international coverage of minor league, women's, and junior hockey. Update this with the Sporting News Hockey Guide; the NHL's Web site, NHL.com; or more general sports Web sites.A team sport not as popular in the U.S. as it is in the rest of the world is soccer. The Complete Encyclopedia of Soccer , appropriately, emphasizes the sport's richer history in Europe, with limited coverage of the Americas. The World Cup and Women's World Cup have both been hosted within the past decade by the U.S., and new fans will be served by this encyclopedia.Tennis and golf are two popular sports contested primarily by individuals and not by teams. Tennis is well covered by Bud Col lins' Tennis Encyclopedia. The World of Tennis 2000 provides almanac-like coverage of the game's past and present.Golf reference works are a little thin, but Inside Sports Golf is a vade mecum of the professional-level men's, women's, and senior men's tours. It also lists hall-of-famers and the top 10 or so finishers in major tournaments and provides a glossary as well as information on golf courses open to the public, course designers, rules, and golf in film and fiction.The Encyclopedia of Figure Skating contains biographical sketches of skaters, histories of the sport's subdisciplines (singles skating, pairs skating, ice dancing, synchronized skating); definitions of its elements (e.g., death spiral ); lists of U.S., world, and Olympic medalists; and articles covering aspects of the sport, such as music, costumes, and scoring.To answer questions concerning the many sports not covered by a quality printed reference tool, libraries will have to use a combination of Web sites, generic sports reference sources, and books that cover technique and strategies for playing. RBB
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From Library Journal

The "Wilson Author" series, begun in 1942, has now reached its 14th installment. This hefty single volume covers authors who obtained prominence in the early to mid-1990s. It differs from previous volumes in that it includes introductory overviews for each of the 320 writers and 130 autobiographical essays written by the authors themselves. These improvements are an asset to the work, allowing both a better understanding of scope and providing a sense of the writing style and personality of each author. Entries range from a single page to several pages, and many include a photograph of the writer. Also included is an in-depth essay on the author's body of work, often book by book (play or poem), and a sense of the critical reception of the work. Each entry concludes with suggested reading and a short list of selected works. The criteria for inclusion is a bit elusive ("critical attention and acclaim"), and thus authors range from John Grisham and Brad Meltzer to E. Annie Proulx, Pico Iyer, and Jonathan Raban. The lack of defining scope aside, this work captures many of the writers shaping the literary decade and should be of particular use to those seeking an overview of an author's work. Recommended for academic libraries and large public libraries.DNeal Wyatt, Chesterfield Cty. P.L., VA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Hw Wilson Co
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0824209567
• ISBN 13: 9780824209568
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 863
• Editor: Thompson Clifford