Policy question on Original Publication Date

[Deedee]

The Raid and Other Stories by Leo Tolstoy has the original publication date as Aug. 26, 1982. I suspect that this is the original publication date of the translation, as Tolstoy died in 1910. The original publication date of the stories included in the book range from 1852 to 1895. Would it be proper to change the original publication date to 1895?

A similiar issue occurs with Letters from the Earth: Uncensored Writings by Mark Twain. Mark Twain died in 1910. How can the original publication date for his writings be decades after that date? The date in the system is currently 1946. My copy gives an original copyright date of 1962. Please advise! And Thanks!

[Nenangs]

I don't know about these particular cases, but sometimes short stories by a long dead but famous authors re-published as an anthology, which had never been published before (the anthology, not the individual work).

in such case the original publication date should be the original publication date of the anthology, not the individual work.

[vicki_girl]

Original publication date for complilations, omnibus editions, etc. has been previously discussed.

The consensus was that if the work contains no new material (other than minimal introductory material), then the original publication date should reflect the publication date of the last published "piece". In the case The Raid and Other Stories by Leo Tolstoy, it should be 1895.

To give a counter example, if the book was published with, say, a recently discovered never-before-seen story, then the original publication date would be the same as the first edition of the collection.

[Ed]

"Letters from the Earth: Uncensored Writings" is a collection or works that was published long after Twain's death, in about 1962.

Parts of the story "Letters from the Earth" had been published earlier in magazines, but that entire collection was published in 1962.