19th-century periodical articles provide a "unique record of
contemporary opinion across an enormous span of subject areas," including
literature, religion, politics, social science, political economy,
women's writing, science, and the arts. Individual periodicals
were the forum for debate in a much broader range of disciplines
than they are today. (Wellesley Index)
19th-century periodicals were also where major literary works such as Dickens's
Oliver Twist were first published. At their height, monthly magazines published
some of the best writing of the era, including fiction by Dickens, Thackeray,
Trollope, Eliot, Hardy, and Henry James; poetry by Tennyson and the Brownings;
and essays by Arnold, Ruskin, and Pater (Victorian Britain: An Encyclopedia 591).
| II. Starting Points for the Study of 19th-Century Periodicals |
1. 
British
Literary Magazines. Ref. PN 5124.L6 B74 1983
Detailed descriptions of the content and history of British literary magazines
from 1698 to the mid-1980s. Volumes 2 and 3 cover 19th-century magazines.
2. Wellesley
Index to Victorian Periodicals. (see #25)
Includes extensive information on the publication history and politics of the
45 periodicals indexed.
3. Victorian
Britain: An Encyclopaedia. Ref. DA 550 .V53 1988
4. Encyclopedia
of the Victorian Era. Ref. DA 550 .E527 2004
5.A
Companion to Victorian Literature and Culture. Stacks PR
461 .C597 1999
6.The
Literary Journal in America to 1900: A Guide to Information Sources. Stacks
Z 6951 .C57
7. Victorian
Periodicals Review. Periodical Stacks
Journal that surveys current scholarship and criticism of the Victorian period.
8. The
Popular Magazine in Britain and the United States, 1880-1960. Stacks
PN 5124.P4 R44 1997
9. The
English Common Reader: A Social History of the Mass Reading Public,
1800-1900. Stacks Z 1003 .A57, pp. 318–47.
10. Victorian
Periodicals: A Guide to Research. Stacks PN 5124.P4
V5 1978
11. 
The
periodicals section of Patrick Leary's "Libraries and Bibliographies" page http://www.victorianresearch.org/libraries.html and Rosemary
T. VanArsdel's Selected Bibliography http://victorianresearch.org/periodicals.html
Both pages are part of the Victoria Research Web http://victorianresearch.org/ and
provide a guide to archives, libraries, journals, bibliographies,
discussion lists, and syllabi related to the study of the Victorian
period.
| III. Sample Bibliographies of Subjects Reflected in 19th-Century
Periodicals |
12. The
British Empire in the Victorian Press, 1832–1867: A Bibliography. Stacks
Z 2021.C7 P32 1987
13. Crime
in Victorian Britain: An Annotated Bibliography from Nineteenth-Century
British Magazines. Stacks Z 5703.5.G7 P35 1993
| IV. Full-Text Sources of 19th-Century
Periodicals |
14. Nineteenth-Century
British Periodicals [microform]. LAU
Microforms Mfilm 1096, with Guide to Reels 1-140
A microfilm collection
of over 200
nineteenth-century periodicals. (See the "Note" section
for a list.) Introducing each periodical is a
historical and descriptive note
placing
the
periodical
in its socio-political context and providing information about
its genesis and development, its rationale, and its changing
policies. Also included is statistical
information such as the journal's price, circulation, editors,
contributors, and readership. The microfilm currently covers only
1800-1840, but
three more installments will be published (1841-60; 1861-80;
1881-1900). To identify relevant articles in any of the 200 journals,
use the Guide to Reels, housed in the Government
Documents and Microforms Department with the collection itself
(Mfilm 1096). There is no full-text index to this collection
of 19th-century periodicals; the guide allows only broad subject
searches, which will lead you to citations of relevant articles.
The full text of cited articles can be found on the appropriate
microfilm frames.
15. 
American
Periodical Series.
Digital images of historically significant American periodicals
from 1740 to 1900, including literary and professional journals,
children’s and women’s
magazines, and popular magazines. Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/.
16. The
Civil War: A Newspaper Perspective.
Contains the full text of over 11,000 articles (including over 700
graphic images of battlefield maps and illustrations) gleaned from
over 2500 issues of newspapers published between Nov. 1, 1860 and Apr.
30, 1865, beginning with events preceeding the outbreak of war at Fort
Sumter, continuing through the surrender at Appomattox and concluding
with the funeral of Abraham Lincoln. Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/.
17. HarpWeek.
Provides full-text electronic access to all issues of Harper's
Weekly (including all illustrations and advertisements) published
between
1857 (first issue)
and 1877, with the capacity to browse or search by date, by literary genre,
and by a person's occupation or role in society. Harper's Weekly is a key American
primary source for studying the 19th century. The intent is to provide the
full text of the journal's entire run, but for now, coverage includes only
1857–1877.
Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/
18. Harpweek:
The 19th Century World.
A free Website archiving materials from Harper's Weekly on specific historical
topics of the nineteenth century, superbly organized for educational purposes
(for research and for teaching primary historical and cultural research to
secondary and post-secondary students). Current highlighted collections include
Black America; the impeachment of Andrew Johnson; Civil War literature; presidential
elections 1860-1884 (including the electoral college issue in the 1876 election);
immigrant and ethnic America; the editorial cartoons of Thomas Nast; the American
West; and 19th-century advertising. Each topic is introduced with contemporary
scholarship.
This free site does not replace HarpWeek. It packages primary documentation
only on particular topics (similar to Encyclopaedia Britannica Online's "Spotlights," or
homepage feature articles), and it lacks HarpWeek's capacity for
searching across all issues of Harper's Weekly. When you recommend
HarpWeek, recommend that students check for current topics on the
free site.
19. Making
of America (MOA).
An extensive, searchable collection of page images from major periodicals and
books with 19th-century imprints. Created as a collaborative project of Cornell
University and the University of Michigan and funded by the Mellon Foundation.
Pages appear as graphic images (.pdf files), but you can also view them as
text, which allows you to use the Edit/Find in page feature to locate your
search word.* The Library of Congress is also collaborating in this project.
*Word of warning: The text files were created through Optical Character
Recognition (OCR) without correction. As a result, a smudge on the
page might have caused the OCR to read "slavery" as "slavory," for
example, so your search results for "slavery" will not be comprehensive.
University
of Michigan's Making of
America http://www.hti.umich.edu/m/moagrp/
This collection currently contains approximately 1,600 books and 10 periodicals
(50,000 articles), such as Appleton's, The Southern Literary Messenger,
and Vanity Fair.
Cornell
University's Making
of America http://moa.cit.cornell.edu/moa/index.html
A digital library of primary sources in American social history
from the antebellum period through reconstruction. This collection
currently contains
24 major periodicals and 114 books (over 100,000 journal articles and 267
monograph volumes). Journals include Putnam's Monthly, Scribner's Magazine,
North American Review, and Century.
The
Library of Congress Nineteenth Century in Print: Periodicals.
In addition to the sources from Cornell University and the University
of Michigan,
the Library of Cngress site contains historical background and
essays on Garden and Forest:
A Journal of Horticulture, Ladnscape Art and Forestry.
20. Godey's
Lady's Book. http://www.uvm.edu/~hag/godey/index.html and
http://www.history.rochester.edu/godeys/
This important journal included fashion plates as well as poems,
fiction, editorials, literary notices, fashion and needlework patterns,
and advice articles. Both websites listed include illustrations.
Godey's Lady's Book, April, 1855: Page 2; Children's Dresses
21. Internet
Library of Early Journals
A joint project of the Universities of Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester, and
Oxford, this site provides digitized, searchable collections of important
18th- and
19th-century British periodicals. The core collection includes at least 20
consecutive years of three 19th-century periodicals: Blackwood's Edinburgh
Magazine, Notes & Queries, and The Builder.
22. New
Moulton's: Pre-Twentieth Century Criticism of British and American
Literature to 1904. Ref. PR 85 .N39 1985
Reprints excerpts of criticism from newspapers, magazines, journals, and book-length
studies. Each volume covers a different period, beginning with Medieval–Early
Renaissance and ending with Late Victorian–Edwardian. Separate index volume.
23.New
York Times Historical.
Complete, fulltext archive of the New York Times, from its first issue on
September 18, 1851. Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/
24. Science
in the Nineteenth-Century Periodical (SciPer).
This project seeks to trace the representation of science, technology,
and medicine across a wide range of 19th-century periodicals. It is jointly
organized by the Centre for Nineteenth-Century Studies in the Department of
English Literature at the University of Sheffield and the Division of History
and Philosophy of Science in the School of Philosophy at the University of
Leeds. SciPer aims "to identify and analyze the representation of science,
technology and medicine, as well as the inter-penetration of science and literature,
in the general periodical press in Britain between 1800 and 1900." It
addresses not only the reception of scientific ideas in the general press,
but also examines the creation of non-specialist forms of scientific discourse
within the periodical format and the ways in which they interact with other
kinds of articles found in nineteenth-century periodicals.
25. Times
Digital Archive
Searchable, electronic version of The Times, Britain's newspaper of record, essential
for primary source research in British history, politics, and culture. Provides
a complete full-text and full-image archive of The Times, 1785-1985. Also available
from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/
26.Wall
Street Journal Historical.
Complete, full text archive of the Wall Street Journal from its first
issue on July 8, 1889 through 1987.
27. Washington
Post Historical.
Complete, fulltext archive of the Washington Post, from its first
issue on December 6, 1877 through 1988.
| V. Citation Indexes to 19th-Century
Periodicals |
28. The
Wellesley Index to Victorian Periodicals, 1824–1900.
The online version of a 5-volume print index [Ref. Z 2005 .H6]. Widely
considered the most important general index to British nineteenth-century periodicals,
it indexes 45 of the most important monthly and quarterly periodicals of the
period, most of which are not indexed in any other bibliographic reference
work. Besides providing a table of contents for the periodicals, the Wellesley
index identifies the authorship of the articles indexed and includes proof
of their attribution. This is considered to be "one of the 20th century's great
feats of collaborative scholarship" (Patrick Leary, http://victorianresearch.org/libraries.html#periodicals),
as nearly 95 percent of the articles were written anonymously (unsigned). The
online version indexes periodicals that were not included in the print edition
and includes all corrections made to the print index. Because it can be searched
by article-keyword, the CD is quite a boon to researchers. It includes information
on the publication history and politics of each periodical and provides brief
biographical information on the contributors. This index is a more specialized
reference tool than Poole's. Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/
29. Periodicals
Index Online
An electronic index providing the tables of contents of thousands of international
periodicals in the arts, humanities and social sciences since 1770. Indexes
both scholarly and popular periodicals. Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/
30.19th
Century Masterfile. 1802-early 20th
C.
Featuring an integrated and enhanced version of Poole's Index to Periodical
Literature (1802-1906) ( Ref. AI 3 .P7) as its centerpiece, 19th
Century Masterfile is rounded out by a number of other general and publication-specific
indexes to the contents of nineteenth-century journals, newspapers, and books.
The focus is on Anglo-American sources. Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/
31.Reader's
Guide Retrospective (1890-1982)
Subject index to articles in general interest periodicals. Includes the Nineteenth
Century Readers' Guide to Periodical Literature, 1890-1899. Ref. AI 3 .R496
Also available from http://www.library.georgetown.edu/advisor/
Specialized Indexes
(See the full-text periodicals sources and citation indexes before
consulting these.)
32. Literary
Reviews in British Periodicals, 1798-1820 and Literary Reviews in
British Periodicals, 1821-1826. LAU Ref. Z 2013 .W36
1977
33. American
Literary and Drama Reviews: An Index to Late Nineteenth Century Periodicals. Ref.
PN 62256 .M37 1984
34. A
Guide to Critical Reviews of United States Fiction, 1870-1910. LAU
Ref. Z 1225 .E35
35. Index
to Nineteenth Century American Art Periodicals. Ref. Z 5935
.S36 1999
36. Victorian
Britain: An Encyclopaedia. Ref. DA 550 .V53 1988
37. A
Companion to Victorian Literature and Culture. Stacks PR
461 .C597 1999
38. Makers
of Nineteenth Century Culture, 1800-1914. Ref. Biog. CT119
.M23
39. Nineteenth
Century Studies. Stacks CB 415 .N56
Interdisciplinary journal published by the Nineteenth Century Studies Association
40. Victorian
Database Online http://www.victoriandatabase.com/victoria.html
Indexes books and book chapters, dissertation abstracts, and articles from
more than 500 British journals published in 1945 and after. The database is
part of LITIR's Victorian Studies on the Web at http://www.victoriandatabase.com/index.html,
which provides links to recent and award-winning publications and to notable
Victorian Web sites.
41. The
Victorian Web http://www.victorianweb.org/
Exceptional comprehensive site for the study of Victorian history, society,
and culture in Britain. Covers literature, society, culture, art, politics,
economy, religion, philosophy, science, technology, and gender relations. Each
area includes biographies, primary texts, analysis, feature articles, and special
projects.
42. Victorian
Studies. Periodical Stacks (1957- ) and Internet (1999-
).
The leading interdisciplinary scholarly journal in the field.
Resources on Patrick Leary's Victoria Research Web were
invaluable in creating this guide.
Please
send us your comments or suggestions
Content updated: 7/01-jh
Links updated: 12/07-nl,mb,jc
