What Is a Literary Source?

By Staff Writer | Last Updated August 4, 2015

Literary sources are the information sources reviewed to create a report or a writing assignment. Sources include information in print, electronic and visual formats such as books.

Creating a report often requires the writer to do research to gather information about the topic of the report. Literary sources are categorized as primary, secondary or tertiary sources. Primary sources are letters, autobiographies and research reports. Secondary sources include reports from primary sources analyzed by others. Tertiary sources include encyclopedias, dictionaries and handbooks.

Literary sources can be obtained at university and public libraries by accessing research databases. EBSCOhost is a common subscription-based research database that many libraries provide.