Subscribe in a readerBullet Tip –> Wikipedia
Oct 5th, 2007 | By Bruce K. Hollingdrake | Category: Bullet TipsHow many times while listing older books do you come across authors that keep all your inner bells silent? One thing I’ve begun doing is whenever I came across I name I don’t recognize I zip over to Wikipedia and do a quick search. Tons of info on just about everybody. Chances are that if he’s not mentioned there he had no lasting influence. Try it out.
Good tip, but be sure to always check the wikipedia site in the country of the author’s origin. For example, we picked up an important herpetology book the other day by Moyse Charas - it was the center of a late 17th century feud on the nature of snake venom - he has a long listing on wikipedia.fr but nothing on wikipedia.com.
Oh yeah, you can always add a wikipedia entry for an unlisted author (if you think/wish they were important) - look them up in the Dictionary of American Biography, online or in other sources and see if that works. You can always make wikipedia work for you.
Thanks Tom, I wasn’t aware of that.