Drama Online: ArtFilms Collections Trial

ArtFilms Trial

The library has started a one-month trial for Drama Online’s ArtFilms collections. We have access through April 25th, 2023. We would love your feedback on the value of these collections to your research and teaching.

Please send any comments to sreardon at berkeley dot edu.

ArtFilms includes the following subcollections:

Asian Theatre Video Collection

The Asian Theatre video collection is an essential resource for students of theatre design and production, as well as contemporary theatre practice. It offers interviews with leading performers and practitioners, and houses a tranche of filmed performances, documentaries, rehearsal footage, and training videos. From Butoh to Bollywood, Bunraku to Topeng, this collection is a vital repository for students and academics interested in Asia’s rich theatrical traditions.

British, American, and Australian Video Collection

Through its focus on contemporary avant-garde troupes such as The Sydney Front, this video collection is an invaluable resource for the study of British, American, and Australian theatre. From the nuances of American puppetry and the skills of Australian Circus performers, to large-scale sculptural productions and political dance pieces, this collection’s rich array of biopics, interviews, workshops, and filmed performances provides a unique multi-media insight into the traditions and adaptations of British, American, and Australian theatre over the last fifty years.

European Theatre Video Collection

Spanning the schools of mime, acrobatics, and puppetry, as well as the theatrical traditions of Belgium, Serbia, and Germany, the European Theatre video collection contains a wealth of stimulating content. Through rare filmed recordings, archival footage, and critical commentaries by leading directors, this collection explores avant-garde groups such as France’s Théâtre du Mouvement, Denmark’s Odin Teatret, and Serbia’s JEL Theatre.

Playwrights and Practitioners Video Collection

Blending interviews with rare rehearsal footage, documentaries with production excerpts, the Playwrights and Practitioners video collection is an essential resource for students, actors, and academics. From the songs of Brecht to the provocations of Burlesque, the collection rings with the voices of Pulitzer and Nobel Prize winners and offers a rich insight into the creative processes of some of the industry’s most esteemed writers and directors.

Shakespeare Video Collection

Showcasing behind-the-scenes videos at the Globe, candid interviews with renowned Shakespeare actors and directors, as well as controversial adaptations of the Bard, the Shakespeare video collection is an ideal resource for students, academics, and practitioners. Rare documentary footage focuses on the Globe’s status as a unique theatrical institution, whilst the collection’s critical commentaries aim to demystify and illuminate Shakespeare’s most challenging works.

Theatre Making and Performance Video Collection

The Theatre Making and Performance Training video collection uses masterclasses, documentaries, and actor interviews to guide students and early-career practitioners through the art of auditioning, vocal training, and stage combat. Through a tailored selection of ‘How To’ resources, the collection also proves essential for those specializing in the design elements of theatre, such as make-up artistry, set design, theatre safety, and lighting.


Trial: Oxford World’s Classics

 

oxford classics

The Library has a trial to Oxford World’s Classics, a collection of works from 18th and 19th century authors complete with introductions, explanatory notes, chronologies, and bibliographies. The trial will run for the month of February.

This collection provides access to over 300 novels and other writings, including translations.

Notable Authors Include:

  • Jane Austen
  • Charlotte Brontë
  • Kate Chopin
  • Arthur Conan Doyle
  • Charles Darwin
  • Charles Dickens
  • Nathaniel Hawthorne
  • Harriot Jacobs
  • Herman Melville
  • Charlotte Perkins Gilman
  • Edgar Allen Poe
  • Oscar Wilde
  • Émile Zola

Note: to access the trial, you will either need to be on campus or use the Library VPN. (EZ Proxy does not work for this trial.)

If the collection is of interest to you, the Library wants to hear from you! Please fill out this form for feedback and any comments you have.


Trial access to Classiques Garnier Numérique

book covers of Classiques Garnier Numérique

The UC Berkeley Library has set up a 60-day trail to all ebook collections and ejournals published by Classiques Garnier Numérique in Paris. Several years ago, the Library purchased perpetual access to several of its databases including Grand Corpus des dictionnaires [du 9e au 20e siècle], Grand Corpus des grammaires françaises, des remarques et des traités sur la langue (XIVe-XVIIe s.), and Corpus Montaigne  but not yet to any of the ejournals or ebook collections.

Since 1896, Éditions Classiques Garnier has been publishing literary works from around the world, French and foreign, ancient and modern, in reference editions. In 2009, under the editorial direction of Claude Blum, the independent publishing house expanded the scope of its publications to all areas relating to literature and social sciences: editing studies and essays in the leading fields in French and foreign literature, linguistics, history, art, music, law, economics and social sciences. The quantity of the signature yellow-bound paperback books in Berkeley’s collection is extensive. The journals we currently subscribe to in print include La Lettre clandestine, Revue d’Histoire et de Philosophie religieuses, Cahiers Octave Mirbeau, Revue Nerval, Bulletin de la Société Paul Claudel, and Constellation Cendrars. Ten of their journals, including Revue d’histoire littéraire de la France, are partially archived in JSTOR but not all available to UCB.

Access to more of the digital content from this publisher would greatly enhance our electronic holdings and expand the accessibility of content in French.  Please give it a try before January 15, 2022 and let me know if you’d like to recommend any titles or collections we might put on our wish-list.

Claude Potts
cpotts AT berkeley DOT edu
Librarian for Romance Language Collections


Trial: Stratford Festival Shakespeare Collection

Stratford Festival Shakespeare Collection: Streaming Performances

The Library has a trial to Stratford Festival Shakespeare, a new video subcollection that would supplement our existing subscription to Drama Online. The trial will run until December 3rd. If the subcollection is of interest to you, the Library wants to hear from you! Please fill out this form for feedback and any comments you have.

This collection includes 10 feature-length films from the Stratford Festival in Ontario, Canada. Located in Stratford, Ontario, Canada, the Stratford Festival is the largest classical repertory theatre company in North America.

Available performances:

  • Antony and Cleopatra
  • Hamlet
  • King John
  • King Lear
  • Love’s Labour’s Lost
  • Macbeth
  • The Adventures of Pericles
  • Romeo and Juliet
  • The Taming of the Shrew
  • Timon of Athens

Coming in Spring 2021:

  • Coriolanus
  • The Tempest

Coming in Spring 2022:

  • Merry Wives of Windsor
  • Othello

Study Guides for each film are also available for free and can be found on a dedicated learning resources page for the collection.

About Drama Online

The UC Berkeley community already has access to great material through Drama Online.  Drama Online (Bloomsbury) is an online resource of primary and secondary sources for the study and performance of drama. It contains 1700 playtexts, 350 audio performances, and 150 hours of video. The platform has a web-based e-reader with page and line numbers that correspond to the print edition, download options, full text search, visualization tools including a Words and Speeches Graph and a Character Grid for each play, the ability to view lines for one specific character, genre, period, title, or playwright browsing, and annotation tools.

You can find:

  • 1,100+ playtexts from Methuen Drama, Faber and Faber, and Arden Shakespeare, as well as contextual and critical background through scholarly works and practical guides.
  • Productions from Shakespeare’s Globe On Screen
  • The National Theatre (London) Collection
  • The Royal Shakespeare Company streaming video
  • The Classic Oscar Wilde Collection
  • L.A. Theatre Works audio collection
  • Playscripts from theatre publisher Nick Hern
  • BBC Drama Films
  • Critical Studies & Performance Practice
  • Aurora Metro Books
  • Playwrights Canada Press

Trial: Frontier Life: Borderlands, Settlement & Colonial Encounters

Image of people on shore looking out onto a bay with a shipThrough November 30th, the Library has a trial for the digital resource Frontier Life: Borderlands, Settlement & Colonial Encounters.  The scope of the resource, as described on the site:

“The earliest documents in this collection are from the seventeenth century but the majority of the material originates from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. The material covering North America covers the varied frontier regions from fur trappers in Canada to cowboys in Texas and government in Baja California. It is divided into the frontier regions of the American East, the American Midwest, the American Southwest, California & Mexico and Canada. It covers the exploration of these regions followed by trade with native peoples, colonial rivalries, expansion of government and new nations and the final settlement and ‘closing’ of the frontier.

Africa is mainly represented by its frontiers of the south with the British colonial expansion into modern day South Africa. There are also excellent clusters of material relating to the exploration of West Africa and the colonial administration of Lagos.

The beginnings of European Australia and New Zealand are covered by British government documents, starting with Arthur Phillip and the penal colony at Sydney. The frontiers of other parts of Australia are also covered by documents from the UK National Archives and some material from Australian archives.

Finally, there is some material relating to Central America, specifically British Honduras (Belize), in the form of the George Arthur Papers. George Arthur’s career here relates to the other regions featured here as he spent time on the Canadian and Australian frontiers.”

 


Trial: Exeter Medieval Online ebook collection

Exeter Medieval Online

UC Berkeley has a trial for Exeter Medieval Online (ebooks) through October 29th, 2020. The collection combines Liverpool University Press’s Exeter Medieval Texts and Studies and Exeter Studies in Medieval Europe print series, covering a chronological range of c.500-1500, with a broad European focus. The interdisciplinary collection includes monographs, guides, collaborative studies, edited volumes, and translations of important texts on the history, literature, and culture of the Middle Ages. The ebook collection provides full-text digital access to 83 titles, which can also be downloaded to PDF.

During the trial period, we have access to a 50-ebook subset of the collection. Logging in with a CalNet ID is required.

To use additional features, you can optionally create a personal account from the ‘Institutional Account’ tab. This will allow you to:
Highlight Text
Add bookmarks
Add/ download Citations
Add/ download Notes
Mark it as Favourite (but this is available from the “My Library” section)

Your feedback makes a difference! Tell us what you think.


Trial: Crime, Punishment, and Popular Culture (1790–1920) Digital Archive

The Library has begun a trial to Crime, Punishment, and Popular Culture (1790–1920) digital archive (Gale). The collection contains over 2 million pages of trial transcripts, police and forensic reports, detective novels, newspaper accounts, and true crime literature from the 19th century. The archive is composed of 22 collections from source libraries including the British Library, National Archives (US), American Antiquarian Society, Library of Congress, and Harvard University Law Library. The content is mostly in English, with some content in French, German, Danish, Finnish, and Hawaiian.

This collection contains materials that could be used to research the causes and effects of the rise in crime during the Industrial Revolution, the development of metropolitan police departments, and the public’s fascination with sensational accounts of crime in newspapers and fiction. It covers changing attitudes about punishment and reform that led to such practices as solitary confinement, prison work programs, and penal transportation, as well as “scientific” theories such as phrenology, which posited that character could be determined by physiognomy.

The interface allows you to view scans of the original items alongside plain-text transcripts, and the full text is searchable. All items have been OCRed (including hand-written items).

The trial will end on 09/20/2020. Please send any feedback to Stacy Reardon: sreardon at berkeley.


Primary Sources: Foreign Office Files for Japan, 1919-1952

map of railwayThe Library has acquired the online archive Foreign Office Files for Japan, 1919-1952, which is sourced from Foreign Office Files from the UK National Archives.  We currently have access to Modules I & II; Module III will be added in the near future.

As described at the site, “these papers throw light on Anglo-Japanese ties in a time of shifting alliances. Documenting Japan’s journey to modernity, the files discuss a period in which the country took on an increasingly bold imperialist agenda. Strong relations following the signing of the Treaty of Versailles were tested then ultimately destroyed, and by December 1941, Japan and the United Kingdom were on opposing sides of the Second World War.

“These Foreign Office files cover British concerns over colonial-held territory in the Far East, as well as Japanese relations with China, Russia, Germany and the United States. Following surrender at the end of the Second World War, Japan was occupied by foreign forces for the first time in its history. The occupation resulted in disarmament, liberalisation and a new constitution as the country was transformed into a parliamentary democracy. Japan emerged once again as a player on the world stage.

“Consisting of diplomatic dispatches, correspondence, maps, summaries of events and diverse other material, this collection from the rich FO 371 and FO 262 series unites formerly restricted Japan-centric documents, and is enhanced by the addition of a selection of FO 371 Western and American Department and Far Eastern sub papers.”

 


Trial: Shakespeare Trilogy, Oscar Wilde Collection, & More in Drama Online

New Subcollections on Trial from Drama Online

The Library has a trial to new subcollections through our subscription to Drama Online. The trial will run from September 30th, 2019 to October 30, 2019. If the subcollections are of interest to you, the Library wants to hear from you! Please fill out this form for feedback and any comments you have. Please note that these collections on trial can be accessed only from on campus.

The Donmar Shakespeare Trilogy on Screen:

The Donmar Shakespeare Trilogy is composed videos of an all-women production of Julius Caesar led by Dame Harriet Walter, Henry IV in 2014, and The Tempest in 2016, all featuring a diverse company of women.

The Classic Spring Oscar Wilde Collection:

Live performances of four classic plays by Oscar Wilde with star-studded casts from London’s West End, including The Importance of Being Earnest and An Ideal Husband.

National Theatre Collection:

National Theatre Live broadcasts and never previously seen outside of the NT’s Archive including comedies such as She Stoops to ConquerOne Man, Two Guvnors, and London Assurance, 20th century classics such as Yerma and Les Blancs, literary adaptations such as Frankenstein, Greek classics such as Medea, and modern stagings of Shakespeare such as Twelfth Night and Romeo and Juliet.

The Royal Shakespeare Company Live Collection (Part 2):

Recordings of live screenings of 8 productions from the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon, such as Twelfth Night, Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet, and Troilus & Cressida. (UC Berkeley already has access to Part 1 of this subcollection.)

About Drama Online

The UC Berkeley community already has access to much of Drama Online.  Drama Online (Bloomsbury) is an online resource of primary and secondary sources for the study and performance of drama. It contains 1700 playtexts, 350 audio performances, and 150 hours of video. The platform has a web-based e-reader with page and line numbers that correspond to the print edition, download options, full text search, visualization tools including a Words and Speeches Graph and a Character Grid for each play, the ability to view lines for one specific character, genre, period, title, or playwright browsing, and annotation tools.

Content UC Berkeley already has access to:

  • 1,100+ playtexts from Methuen Drama, Faber and Faber, and Arden Shakespeare, as well as contextual and critical background through scholarly works and practical guides.
  • Productions from Shakespeare’s Globe On Screen
  • Early modern drama titles staged and filmed specifically for educational use (Doctor Faustus, The Duchess of Malfi, Volpone and School for Scandal).
  • L.A. Theatre Works audio collection
  • Playscripts from theatre publisher Nick Hern
  • BBC Drama Films
  • Shakespeare’s Globe on Screen (2016-2018)
  • Shakespeare’s Heroes & Villains
  • Critical Studies & Performance Practice
  • Aurora Metro Books
  • Playwrights Canada Press

Trial: Literary Print Culture

The Library has a trial to Literary Print Culture: The Stationers’ Company Archive.

What You’ll Find:

  • A unique archive relating to the history of printing, publishing, and bookselling dating from 1554 to the 21th century.
  • The Entry Book of Copies (1554-1842), used to establish copyright belonging to publishers, booksellers and eventually authors until the introduction of automatic copyright in 1912.
  • The Membership Records (1555-1940), providing valuable biographical information on the printing and publishing community and members of the Stationers’ Company. 
  • The Court Records (1602-1982), an essential source for understanding the workings of the Stationers’ Company and for dating texts or tracing editions.
  • The English Stock documents (1603-1961), which recorded the activities of the successful publishing arm of the Stationers’ Company.
  • The Treasurers’ vouchers (1734-1800) detail English Stock payments for printing, paper and advertising almanacs and other English Stock books.

The trial will run from September 13, 2019 to October 11th, 2019. Please note that these trials are available only from on-campus.

If the collection is of interest to you, the Library wants to hear from you! Please fill out this form for feedback and any comments you have.

The UC Berkeley Library also has temporary trials until October 11th, 2019 for the following digital collections from Adam Matthew: