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E-BOOKS (ELECTRONIC BOOKS)

There is great diversity in what constitutes an electronic book (a.k.a. e-book). The primary emphasis of this guide is on websites which provide freely available resources. Sites which are totally commercially oriented are not discussed, although some sites listed below do include online bookstores or commercial e-book vendors as a component of the site. Sites discussed here concentrate on "gateways" and some of the best-known and respected sites. Many specialized sites exist, with author-specific and topic-specific focuses.

Free online literature (and e-texts for humanities-oriented resources) is available from a variety of sources, which include the following: academic institutions, collaborative projects between academic institutions, professional association/organizations, collaborative projects between academic institutions and professional associations/organizations, public libraries, "mixed" sites which consist of freely available resources and commercial activity.

Most (but not all) resources are no longer under copyright. Aside from book-length literature/fiction, resources include novellas, plays, short stories and poetry. Download/ reproduction policies vary widely: It is particularly important to understand the rights and restrictions which a site imposes and to adhere to them.

Most freely available resources fall into several categories: book-length literature/fiction, "the classics," and humanities texts/documents, most of which deal with Western thought. However, there also are links to sites for non-Western literary and cultural resources.


Alex Catalogue of Electronic Texts

• Maintained by Eric L. Morgan, Infomotions, Inc.
• "A collection of about 14,000 "classic" public domain documents from American and English literature as well as Western philosophy"
• Browsable by author/title; searchable
• Includes "help" feature which suggests the best ways to utilize Alex
• Outstanding; one of the best sites for access to a significant portion of the "great books" of Western thought


Bartlbey.com: Great Books Online

• Offers a collection of e-texts by over 200 authors, free of charge
• Browsable by author, title, subject
• Links to the following reference works: Columbia Encyclopedia (6th ed.), American Heritage Dictionary (4th ed.), Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, American Heritage Book of English Usage, Bartlett's Familiar Quotations
• Excellent; provides online access to some of the best-known reference works, as well as literary offerings


Bibliomania

• Developed for Bibliomania by PanEris.org, "a collection of web developers working together as a virtual corporation"
• Links to over "2000 Classic Texts," which include drama, fiction (with an emphasis on 19th and early 20th century literature), poetry, short stories
• Includes biographical profiles of all authors (with "recommended web sites", in many instances, for additional information)
• Texts may be downloaded and used for academic/research purposes; commercial use is forbidden
• Includes study guides for selected works, "Help for Teachers," information for online book shopping
• Outstanding; although this site has only been online for several years, it is one of the most widely known and offers a great selection of texts


Books

• Maintained by the Houston Cole Library, Jacksonville State University
• Directory of links to categories of book-related sites, including "Books (Full Text)"
• Other categories include "Best Books," "Book Reviews," "Banned Books," and "Children's and Young Adult Literature"
• Excellent annotations
• Complements "Electronic Books" (please see below)
• Outstanding; this is one of the best academic sites for links to all facets of e-books


Digital Book Index

• This webpage is "… intended as a ‘Meta-Index' for most major eBook sites; … links to more than 137,000 title records for more than 1800 commercial and non-commercial publishers"
• "About 97,000 of these books, texts and documents are available free"
• Non-commercial publishers include several hundred university presses and archival e-text sites
• Links to the following topical areas: reference books, language/literature, history, social sciences, medicine/health, math/sciences, philosophy/religion
• Browsable by subject/publisher, searchable by title/keyword, browsable/searchable by author
• Each link includes the following: author, title, edition (when applicable), format, price (if applicable), "Puborg" (publisher or sponsoring organization)
• Registration required (but its free!)
• Loads slowly during peak usage hours
• Outstanding; the 97,000 free titles alone make this one of the premium sites of its kind; subject index is excellent


Digital Librarian: Electronic Texts and Primary Sources

• Maintained by Margaret Vail Anderson
• Browsable directory (arranged alphabetically by site name) of almost 300 sites linking to the following: e-texts (largely from academic sites), digital projects/resources, primary sources (oral histories, historical documents, manuscripts, images)
• Also links to professional associations/organizations
• International in scope (with a primary emphasis on the U.S.); some sites (primarily European) are in languages other the English
• Brief annotations accompany many sites
• Links to other "Digital Librarian" pages: "Archives & Manuscripts," "Images," "Literature," "Magazines & Journals"
• Excellent selection of links, including many of the most authoritative resources; great place for an overview of the field and also a very useful place to begin research


Electronic Books

• Created by Karen Ramos for the Stockton-San Joaquin County Public Library
• Directory of annotated links to categories of book-related sites, including "Free E-Book Sites"
• Other features include "Commercial Sites," "Free Personal Digital Assistant Sites," "E-Book Reader Software," "Dedicated E-Book Readers"
• Also includes tips on reading e-books online, "saving" free e-books
• Excellent annotations
• Complements "Books" (please see above)
• Outstanding; one of the best online sites for links to all facets of -ebooks


Electronic Literature Directory

• Sponsored by the Electronic Literature Organization
• Provides access to an eclectic assortment of electronic literary formats
• "Genre/Length" browses poetry, fiction, drama and non-fiction by "short," "long," and "collections"
• "Technique/Genre" browses poetry, fiction, drama and non-fiction by hypertext, recorded reading/performance, animated text, generated text, reader collaboration and other multimedia
• Searchable
• Excellent source for non-traditional online texts, especially by lesser-known authors


Electronic Text Center (ETC)

• Established and maintained by the University of Virginia Library since 1992
• "The Electronic Text Center's holdings include approximately 70,000 on- and off-line humanities texts in many languages, with hundreds of thousands of related images"
• Most e-texts available on this site are "out-of-copyright"; also includes documents created by at the University of Virginia
• Copyrighted resources (commercially-provided e-books and e-journals) are restricted to the University of Virginia academic community
• Links to other resources, services of the library
• Outstanding; ETC has been in the forefront of e-text availability on the Internet; remains one of the most comprehensive and easy-to-navigate sites of its kind


EServer: Accessible Writing

• Originally developed at Carnegie Mellon University (1990), this page is currently maintained at Iowa State University
• Formerly known as the English Server
• "A member-run cooperative," the Eserver has published over 35,000 works by hundreds of "writers, artists, editors and scholars"
• "Our Collections" is a browsable directory of 44 topics (primarily in literature, the humanities, and social sciences)
• "Publish With Us" encourages the submission of "new works" (subject to the approval of EServer staff); no commercially published works are accepted, however
• Membership is free; members have the opportunity to work on collaborative projects, become an editor or become a board member
• Includes discussion forum
• Searchable
• Outstanding; a very useful resource for participation and interaction in online publishing in the humanities, literature, and the social sciences


Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts

• Maintained by D.L. Ashliman, retired professor of German, University of Pittsburg
• Links to hundreds of full-text legends, myths and folklore
• Browsable by author, title or subject (interfiled alphabetically)
• Primary scope is Europe and the ancient world; also includes significant content for Asia
• Links to other pages by D.L. Ashliman
• Outstanding; most comprehensive site of its kind; essential for anyone researching this area


Great Books Index

• Maintained by Ken Roberts, Ken Roberts Corporate Consultants, Inc.
• "An Index to Online Great Books in English Translation"
• Not associated with but "suggested and inspired by the Great Books of the Western World project"
• Links to works by 125 authors from the ancient world to the 20th century
• Emphasis is on literature, religion, philosophy, political theory
• Most texts are free, but a limited number "… may be subject to copyright"
• Some individual titles by specific authors may also be linked to more than one online version
• All authors included have written at least one "great book;" if the author has additional online titles, these are also linked
• Links to analytical/critical material about an author is included (if available)
• "Book Links" links to other "Great Books" sites
• Excellent; one of the best e-text sites for the humanities; outstanding selection of core documents of Western thought


Harvard Classics and Harvard Shelf of Fiction

• Sponsored by Bartleby.com
• Online, full-text version of "The Harvard Classics" (50 vol.) and "Harvard Shelf of Fiction" (20 vol.)
• Edited by Charles W. Eliot, American educator and former president of Harvard
• "Together they cover every major literary figure, philosopher, religion, folklore and historical subject through the twentieth century"
• Originally published by P.F. Collier and Son, 1909-1917
• Scope is international, from ancient times through the early 20th century
• Searchable
• Excellent; although the works linked to these anthologies are not comprehensive as the site description states, nevertheless, it remains one of the best resources for an understanding of Western thought


Humanities Text Initiative

• A project of the University of Michigan's Digital Library Production Service, the HTI "… is an umbrella organization for the creation, delivery, and maintenance of electronic texts"
• HTI's collection links to over 30 sites for literature, history, sacred books and Michigan-oriented resources, all of which "… are freely available to the Internet community"
• "American Verse Project, an archive of American poetry through 1920, is recognized as one of the most significant resources in online poetry collections"
• Another highly-regarded resource is "Making of America," a collaboration between the University of Michigan and Cornell University, which is "… a digital library of primary sources in American social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction," with an emphasis on education, psychology, history, sociology, religion, science and technology
• Outstanding; another highly-regarded resource from academia


Internet Sacred Text Archive (ISTA)

• Maintained by John B. Hare
• This archive's mission is to provide "… a freely available, non-profit archive of electronic texts about religion, mythology, legends and folklore, and occult and esoteric topics"
• Promotes tolerance and does not favor any particular religions or spiritual movements
• Provides links to primary texts of faiths/religions; when primary text material is not available, secondary sources have been substituted
• Includes a "… comprehensive bibliography of the texts scanned"
• Includes an excellent FAQ feature
• Excellent resource for primary sources, especially useful for little-known religions


Oxford Text Archive (OTA)

• Sponsored by the Arts and Humanities Data Service (UK)
• "The OTA has over twenty years of experience of collecting, preserving, and redistributing electronic texts to the worldwide academic community"
• "Holds several thousand electronic texts and linguistic corpa, in a variety of languages"
• Works by over 500 authors are currently available
• Scope is international, from ancient times through the 20th century; emphasis is on Western thought
• Most (but not all) texts may be downloaded at no charge; these texts may be used for educational/research purposes only
• Outstanding; one of the pioneering e-text resources and still one of the best


Primary Sources

• Part of the outstanding "Web Based Resources," a gateway to e-journals/websites, by Lewis A. Armstrong, William Allan White Library, Emporia State University
• "This site is always under construction"
• Links to primary sources for the following: historical collections, library projects, directories of projects, digitalization information, dissertations/theses, online books, organizations/centers
• Annotations accompany many links
• Includes "Dead Links Archive"
• Excellent; not extensive, but it links to many of the best e-text projects


Project Gutenberg (PG)

• Created by Michael Hart in 1971, Project Gutenberg, "the Internet's oldest producer of FREE electronic books," currently has over 20,000 full-text literary classics and other works of distinction (history, philosophy, political theory, religion) available
• "The Project Gutenberg Philosophy is to make information, books and other materials available to the general public in forms a vast majority of the computers, programs and people can easily read, use, quote, and search"
• Browse by author/title; also searchable
• PG texts run the gamut from ancient to modern times, with an emphasis on Western thought; also includes some world literature
• Some titles may contain texts from different sources
• Texts are primarily from the English language; limited amount of titles from 30 other languages
• Outstanding; the pioneer site for freely available on-line texts and still one of the best


Repositories of Primary Sources

• Maintained by Terry Abraham, University of Idaho Library
• Links to over 5,500 sites for primary sources (manuscripts, archives, rare books, oral histories, historical photographs)
• Browsable by location
• Scope is international, with an emphasis on the U.S.
• Links to "Additional Lists" of primary sources
• Excellent site for "one-stop-shopping" for primary source repositories


UT Library Online – Electronic Books

• Maintained by the University of Texas at Austin General Libraries
• Directory of e-text sites for the following categories: "Major Text Sites," classic texts, computer books, literature in English, philosophy, religion, poetry, world literature, "Other Text Collections"
• "Major Text Sites" link(s) to some of the most authoritative "gateways" and online guides (especially for literature and the humanities)
• Component sections of "Major Text Sites" are included as links within other categories, a very useful feature
• Some sites are restricted to the University of Texas at Austin academic community
• Annotations are excellent
• Searchable
• Also links to sites for online bookstores, online publishers, book information sites
• Outstanding; this is one of the best academic sites of its kind; mandatory for anyone with an interest in this area


Websites discussed on this page are for informational purposes only. Johnson & Wales University Library is not responsible for the accuracy, content or stability of any websites linked to this page.

Compiled by Rick Keogh, 12/04; links last checked 9/07

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