II
Having decided the arrangement of the material relating to a single
edition and to the editions of a single book[36] leaves untouched the larger
question of
the arrangement of the bibliography as a whole—the arrangement,
in
other words, of the entries for all the various publications that are a part of
the author's career. That this question may seem less urgent suggests how
entrenched a particular approach to overall arrangement has become and
indeed is an interesting reflection of the
history of the development of author bibliography. Most bibliographies
today, as in the past, begin with a section describing the author's separate
publications (whether book, pamphlet, or broadside), usually in
chronological order; this section is followed by one (or several) recording
books contributed to in some way by the author and then by one listing
contributions to periodicals. The precise plan varies, but the general
movement from separate publications to periodicals prevails.
[37] The emphasis on books, with the
concomitant subordination of periodical contributions, is achieved both by
placing the books first and by according them detailed description, in
contrast to the simple listings provided for the periodical pieces. Although
one must admit that books generally are of greater significance and
influence than periodical contributions, one must also acknowledge that this
arrangement is an outgrowth of the original role of bibliographies as
guides for collectors, who were (and have continued to be) more interested
in books (including those containing the first book publication of pieces by
the collected author) than in periodicals. Even though the trend from Sadleir
onward has been to recognize bibliographies as works of historical
scholarship—which in fact serve collectors much better than the
overly
simple guides did—the plan of arrangement has never outgrown its
origins and comes to us now trailing its Wise-Sadleir-Soho lineage.
[38] It is thus so widely accepted that
it is
generally not even thought of as an issue, whereas the treatment of an
edition on a level of detail that would involve subeditions and platings is
new enough to seem a pressing problem. The arrangement of individual
works, however, has a more profound effect on the shape of
a
bibliography as a whole than does the arrangement of the editions of those
works and their impressions.
Actually there is much to be said for the traditional arrangement of
works in a bibliography, even if it is not what historically underlies the
arrangement. Certainly collectors interested in writers' careers should not
have neglected periodicals, for contributions to periodicals may have been
more important in establishing the authors' reputations than were separate
book or pamphlet publications. Similarly, anthology appearances,
also neglected, may play a greater role than book-length publications in
extending a writer's influence.
[39]
Even so, form of publication is a basic fact that can serve as a useful
principle of organization. Placing books first, contributions to books
second, and contributions to periodicals third need not imply decreasing
interest for collectors; it can simply refer to basic differences in type of
publication, differences that form a natural basis for division into
sections.
[40] But however natural such
an arrangement may seem, one should be aware in using it of other possible
approaches that are thereby being rejected. In particular, chronology is
being put in second place, taking over only within each section and not
determining the overall order of entries in the bibliography. One could
argue that the course of a writer's career might be better shown by a single
chronological record of all the works, regardless of
their length or their form of publication, arranged according to the dates of
the first publication of each.
[41]
Readers of bibliographies, accustomed to the convention of describing
books in considerable detail and periodical pieces in simple listings, might
object that an overall chronological arrangement would result in an
awkward mixture of single-line entries and multi-page descriptions. This
objection is of course based on purely formal considerations and does not
affect the logic of the arrangement. Besides, there is no reason why
contributions to periodicals cannot be described as fully as separate
publications are: they are equally a part of the author's career, and some
of them may be more important than some of the books and pamphlets. In
making these points, I am not arguing that a single chronological
arrangement is necessarily preferable to the conventional plan; indeed, I
think that the usual division into sections according to the
type of publication may well be more appropriate in many situations. What
I do wish to suggest is that bibliographers who choose the conventional
arrangement should give some thought to what they are doing and not adopt
it simply as a matter of routine. As with the presentation of any other
research, the form should grow out of the special requirements of the
material. The conventional scheme, though it was shaped by an
old-fashioned and narrow approach to book collecting, can still be justified,
but it is not
law. Bibliographers should think the question through in each instance,
taking into account the problems raised by the career they are dealing
with.
If one decides that there is good reason after all to separate the
description of those books, pamphlets, and broadsides wholly or
substantially written by the author from the treatment of composite
publications (containing some work by the author along with work by other
writers), one still has to consider what arrangement is best within these two
categories. Whereas all the separate publications by an
author—whether
books, pamphlets, or broadsides—are usually kept together in a
single
chronological section,[42] the
composite publications are normally divided into at least two sections, one
for periodicals and one for books. The latter section (called "Contributions
to Books" or a similar phrase) is sometimes further subdivided and in any
case (whether subdivided or not) is likely to contain several kinds of items,
as far as publication history is concerned: contributions (pieces written for,
or at any rate first published in, a particular
book—e.g., as an introduction or as a contribution to an anthology);
collected pieces (writings for a periodical, now first collected in book
form);[43] and appearances (pieces
appearing in book publication for at least the second time). These
distinctions are legitimate but have often been made by bibliographers
primarily in order to focus attention on "firsts," following the lead of many
book collectors in the older tradition. The first two of these classifications,
referring to books containing the first publication in book form of pieces by
the author, are sometimes described in considerable detail; but the items in
the third group, not involving first book publication, are apt to be given
abbreviated entries, or not even listed at all (as often happens with school
and college anthologies). Frequently, however, this last category (especially
the anthologies) plays a crucial role in the establishment of an author's
reputation. And as far as
textual significance is concerned, one cannot rule out any printing (even in
an anthology) that appeared during the author's lifetime, at least not until
one has investigated its publication history.[44] (Printings that prove to
have no significance for establishing the author's intended text are still of
textual interest historically: it is important to know, for instance, precisely
what text of a particular work was encountered by thousands of readers in
a popular anthology.)
These points do not in themselves constitute an argument for or
against placing contributions, collected pieces, and appearances together in
a single section, but they should be kept in mind in thinking about the
question. Firstness, after all, is not the only criterion of significance; and
if non-first appearances in books are relegated to a separate section, the
reason cannot be that they are less important than the other categories.
However the entries are finally arranged, the bibliographer must make clear
in some way which of these categories each entry falls into.[45] The trouble with some of the
"Contributions to Books" sections in bibliographies is not that they mix
unlike items but that they fail to comment adequately on the publication
history of each item. Whether such a section should be subdivided (or
whether indeed it fails to include enough and should incorporate
contributions to periodicals as well) is a matter to be settled only by
considering the nature of the author's publication record. In some cases
separate sections will appear appropriate and helpful, and in other cases
they will not. If division is decided upon, it will not necessarily be limited
to the three categories I have mentioned, for further categories may be
required by the material. Donald Gallup, for example, in his bibliography
of T. S. Eliot (1969), gathers books containing letters by Eliot into a
separate section. It is also worth noting that he places books edited by Eliot
in the same section with books that have original contributions by him,
whereas a bibliographer dealing with a different author might decide to
create a separate section for books edited by that author. One might, in the
case of an author who contributed many poems and stories to composite
volumes, divide the entries by genre, recording the poems in one section
and the stories in another. One might do the same thing, of course, for
contributions to
periodicals:[46] it is important to
remember that a division between first printings and later printings or
between verse and fiction is applicable to periodical pieces as well as to
pieces in composite volumes and may on occasion be worth making for
periodical pieces.
The central point, here as elsewhere, is to think about the categories that
are most useful in a given situation and not to accept mechanically any plan
simply because it has already been used for a different body of material and
has achieved a measure of acceptance.
The amount of detail recorded for individual items is, as I have said,
a separate matter from the arrangement of those items. Nevertheless, the
two questions continually intersect, as the foregoing has made plain.
Sometimes the implied reason for the separate listing of a certain category
of material is the difference in the treatment accorded it, which in turn
reflects its perceived importance. These factors are not entirely separable,
therefore; and if a formerly subordinated category is shown to deserve
fuller treatment, there is then no formal reason for its segregation, though
there still may be a substantive reason. The general issue of the relative
elaboration of detail deemed appropriate for different entries is still referred
to by the label Falconer Madan gave it in 1906, when he spoke of
"degressive" bibliography.[47]
Although this is not the place for a full consideration of the "degressive
principle,"[48] I
think it fair to say that the idea of giving more extended treatment to some
materials than to others is generally accepted; in any report of
research—or in any piece of writing, for that matter—one
must decide
which are the principal aims or emphases of the work and which are the
subordinate ones and then adjust the relative proportions accordingly. One
cannot be faulted simply for giving less attention to certain matters or
certain editions, for one cannot do everything; what is significant is the
intelligence with which the decisions to emphasize or subordinate are made.
Bibliography is not the only field in which such decisions are often made
unwisely; but the frequent failure to understand that descriptive
bibliographies are scholarly accounts, not mechanical compilations, has
meant that some conventional practices in the field have been routinely
accepted without sufficient examination of what rationale justifies them.
Bibliographers do sometimes give evidence of having
thought about why they have decided to describe in less detail editions
published after the authors' deaths; but it is rare indeed to find that they
have thought about why they simply list, rather than describe, contributions
to periodicals or why in many cases they
describe books contributed to by an author in less detail than books entirely
written by that author. Are not composite volumes books, with all the
potentialities for variation, in both text and physical makeup, that other
books have? And are not periodicals the same as composite volumes, being
printed matter made up of contributions by various writers? Why, then, has
the custom grown up of giving them slighter description, or none at
all?
[49]
In large part the reason is that collectors have not in the past been
very interested in these kinds of material. Books containing original
contributions (or even pieces first collected in book form) have elicited
greater interest than posthumous editions or periodical pieces, and these
degrees of attention are still often reflected in bibliographies (even those by
bibliographers who understand that in part they are writing publishing
history). A defensible argument can in fact be made for these proportions,
but only on different grounds. As a chronicler of an author's career, one
cannot justify downgrading periodicals or classroom anthologies or late
editions, or even the less severe subordination of books with original
contributions or with first reprintings in book form: all these publications
have played their roles, small or large (often very large indeed), in the
author's career. One may of course decide, as in any research, to focus on
certain aspects of one's subject or
on certain events or publications; but some forms of publication are not
inherently less in need of full description than others, for all are printed
items, in which production history and textual content continually intersect.
The justification for giving some classes of publication less detailed
treatment is more convincingly made on practical grounds: one may have
to cut down somewhere in order to make the task manageable enough to
complete at all. A natural place to cut may seem to be composite volumes
and periodicals, for one may feel that these publications, involving many
authors, are not primarily the responsibility of the bibliographers of the
individual authors included in them. A considerable duplication would
indeed result if such books and periodicals were extensively described in the
bibliographies of all the authors appearing in them; the preferable situation
would clearly be for bibliographers to write separate descriptive
bibliographies of individual periodicals
and of specific
groups of anthologies.
[50] But research
cannot be forced into such orderly paths, and scholars cannot very
responsibly adduce the possible future duplication of effort as a reason for
not pursuing in the present certain lines of inquiry relevant to their subjects.
They can say that they are focusing on books wholly written by an author,
rather than books and periodicals contributed to by that author, simply
because they find the former a more interesting subject and because they do
not have the time or energy to deal with the latter. Such reasoning is hard
to quarrel with, even when it results in bibliographies that seem to many
people to have obvious deficiencies. But one may indeed protest if the basis
for proceeding in this fashion is the idea that periodicals and books with
contributions do not deserve or require so thorough a treatment—or
if the
bibliographer is following, without examination, the notion that
bibliographies are always done this
way.
The same thinking applies as well to late or posthumous editions and
printings of the author's own books. Some of the discussion concerning the
degressive principle has centered on the question whether full attention to
such editions and printings would not involve shifting the focus of the
bibliography from the author to the printing and publishing history of a later
period. As long as one recognizes, however, that an author's text is
inextricably bound up with the printing and publishing process and that later
editions and printings—with the particular texts they
contain—are
crucial for understanding the course of an author's reputation and influence,
one cannot defend abbreviating their treatment on these grounds.[51] One can simply declare that one
is dealing
only with printings appearing during the author's lifetime, or during any
other specific period, for one is naturally free to set—indeed, must
set—limits to the scope of one's
work. The decision to use (for instance) the date of the author's death as
the dividing line between full and shorter entries can be respected (though
not welcomed) if it is made for practical reasons—but not if it results
from the bibliographer's belief that
sound bibliographical theory requires, or at least supports, the distinction
and that later printings are more properly treated by the student of printing
and publishing than the student of the author. My point, as before, is that
bibliographers should think about each situation in its own terms and not
complacently accept some preconceived plan. Degressive descriptions are
certainly defensible, but the categories offering the best candidates for less
detailed treatment are not necessarily the same from bibliography to
bibliography. Whether the decision to give certain items less full treatment
precedes or follows the decision to group the entries for those items in a
separate section, the two questions are related. What we must
avoid—or
else bibliographical scholarship will suffer—is allowing a particular
arrangement, which often implies particular levels of detail, to become so
established that we accept it without thinking about how it contributes to the
ultimate goals
of our work.
