Welcome to this database

This project was granted the "International Innovation Award 2005" on the occasion of the XVIth International Conference of the Association for History and Computing (Amsterdam, 14-17 September 2005).

The WomenWriters database is one of the first products of the NWO research project Women Writers and their audiences (1997 - 2004). It was placed on the Internet in April 2001 and forms the basis of the NWO digitization project The International Reception of Women's Writing. Women authors from Holland and abroad read by Dutch audiences, 1700-1900 (www.womenwriters.nl). As the title suggests, this project - which is running from 2004 to 2007 - focuses on the reception of women writers in the Netherlands. It is being carried out at the University of Utrecht's Research Institute for History and Culture (OGC) under the direction of Suzan van Dijk.

WomenWriters contains information (book titles, data, facts, and starting points for interpretation) on the literary production of European and North American women up to c. 1900 and on the reception of these works by contemporaries and literary historians (both men and women). One section of the data - the factual information - is accessible to all at www.databasewomenwriters.nl; users wishing to gain access to quotations or information on the content of works require a password, which they may obtain from Suzan.vanDijk@let.uu.nl. In return for their use of the database, password holders are kindly requested to help us expand it by making a contribution.

As the purpose of this database is to facilitate research into the position, production and (contemporary) reception of women writers, the information it contains may be freely used by researchers, students, librarians, documentalists and others. We do, however, urge everyone who uses this information in a publication to quote their source as follows: "This information was derived from/obtained via WomenWriters (ed. Suzan van Dijk), www.databasewomenwriters.nl (+ date of consultation)". Users should be aware that the database is a work in progress - we would be very grateful to them for pointing out any errors or gaps that they might find.

The database contains information about the literary production of European women and the ways in which contemporaries and literary critics of both sexes responded to their writings. The main focus is on the communication between female literary authors writing before c.1900 and the recipients of their works.

By clicking the icons on the left of the screen you get access to:

• A list of all authors contained in the WomenWriters database (even the anonymous ones)
• Biographical information about the authors: dates, production, links to other sites, etc.
• Information about the works: dates of publication, editions and re-editions, links to other sites, etc.
• References to texts evidencing the (international) reception of the works, e.g. reviews in the periodical press and translations.
• Reports - We have predefined some reports in printable format.

Requirements for your computer:
You can search the database with any current browser.
If you want to contribute, you can use Internet Explorer 6 or 7 on Windows, Firefox 1.5 or 2 (on all platforms), Opera 9 (on all platforms), or Safari 1.3 and newer (on Mac OS X 10.3.9 and 10.4)

You will find more details on the current NWO project in a brief PowerPoint presentation and the instructions for use.

To join the project and to obtain a password, please contact Suzan van Dijk at Suzan.vanDijk@let.uu.nl

The International Reception of Women's Writing
NWO - OGC, Universiteit Utrecht
Visiting address: Drift 21, room 2.09
Postal address: Janskerkhof 13, 3512 BL Utrecht, the Netherlands
Tel: + 31 (0)30-253 7980
http://www.databasewomenwriters.nl
http://www.womenwriters.nl