James L. Harner

“ A biographical dictionary of living notable and eminent individuals from throughout the world (there are over 25,000 persons, including 1,000 new entrants, in the 78th ed., 2014) . The compact entries provide basic biographical and career information, selected publications and awards, and address. A list of reigning royal families appears at the beginning. Entrants in several editions are indexed in Biography and Genealogy Master Index (J565) . ”

“ A few entries are accompanied by a brief description of scope. Appendixes list by state the location of obituary card files for the United States and online databases that index obituaries. Indexed by subject (but so incompletely that users must scan all possibly relevant sections) . Although the work is inconsistently organized, inadequately indexed, too reliant on other sources rather than personal examination, and sketchy in covering foreign sources, Jarboe leads researchers to the major—as well as several obscure and local—indexes to obituaries. ”

“ Users can e-mail, print, download, bookmark, share on social network sites, listen to, or translate into a few major languages an entry or save it to a list for e-mailing, bookmarking, downloading, or printing with other entries. Although depending heavily on Gale publications for content, Gale Biography in Context does offer a convenient way of searching a group of standard biographical dictionaries. ”

“ Entries can be searched by name, title of work, birth year, death year, nationality, subject or genre, full text, birth place, death place, personal information, career, honors and awards, and media adaptations. While the electronic version speeds up access, it needs a clear explanation of its relation to its print ancestors and of the nature and extent of revision. ”

“ A majority of the individuals covered are Americans. Indexed in each issue and cumulation by professions and occupations. Highly selective and providing no explanation of the criteria governing the selection process and citing many publications that are only remotely biographical, the source is useful principally for locating biographical material in periodicals.
Coverage in Biography Index Past and Present and Biography Index Retrospective begins with 1946; Biography Index includes only entries since July 1984. Both use the EBSCO search interface (I512) . ”

“ Although formulaic in organization, predictable in style, usually uncritical in interpretation, and relying largely on popular sources and information supplied by biographees, Current Biography does treat a substantial number of writers from throughout the world. ”

“ Gesamtregister der Verweisungen / General Index of References / Table générale des renvois. A massive index to entries on more than 3 million people (as of mid-2005) in several thousand universal and specialized biographical dictionaries published throughout the world. ”

“ Biographical Dictionaries Biographical dictionaries offer basic information about the life, career, and accomplishments of individuals. Those that include living persons will sometimes provide an address or other contact information. ”

“ Browse People is organized by group or occupation. Searching any of the preceding will lead to a screen that displays a person’s name (including variant forms) , occupation, and lifespan, along with links to resources that include the person ”

“ Coverage of literary figures is especially strong. Because of the sheer size of the work, the best access is offered by the electronic version, even though the search interface is poorly designed. Review: Bruce Bonta and Frances Cable, RSR: Reference Services Review 10.1 (1982) : 25–33.
Gale has used this database to produce several clones, some of which include additional entries; those of most interest to literary researchers are the following:
Almanac of Famous People: A Comprehensive Reference Guide to More than 40,000 Famous and Infamous Newsmakers from Biblical Times to the Present. Ed. ”

“ Both are composed largely of entries from American Reference Books Annual (K745) ; neither selection nor evaluation is as rigorous as it should be (especially in the 1986 volume) , and 1986–1997 includes in the literature section a number of works that are only marginally biographical resources.
Indexes J565 Biography and Genealogy Master Index. InfoTrac. Gale-Cengage, n.d. 12 Sept. 2014. . ”

“ Kristin Mallegg. 10th ed. 2 vols. Detroit: Gale-Cengage, 2011. Artist Biographies Master Index. Ed. Barbara McNeil. 1986. 700 pp. Author Biographies Master Index. Ed. Geri Speace. 5th ed. 2 vols. 1997. Children’s Authors and Illustrators (U5500) . Historical Biographical Dictionaries Master Index. Ed. McNeil and Miranda C. Herbert. 1980. 1,003 pp. Performing Arts Biography Master Index. Ed. McNeil and Herbert. 2nd ed. 1982. 701 pp. Twentieth-Century Author Biographies Master Index. Ed. McNeil. 1984. 519 pp. Writers for Young Adults: Biographies Master Index (U5500a) . ”