Selected Bibliography of Primary Sources

Polnoe sobranie sochinenii v devianosto tomakh. 90 vols [Complete Collected Works in Ninety Volumes]. Moscow and Leningrad: Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel’stvo Khudozhestvennoi Literatury, 1928-1958. Called the “Jubilee Edition” because its publication commenced on the one hundredth anniversary of Tolstoi’s birth, this is the standard scholarly edition of Tolstoi’s works. It contains printed and manuscript variants, supplemented by introductions to and commentary on the texts. In addition, it contains the most complete collection of Tolstoi’s letters, diaries, notebooks, and other personal papers. Online access to the entire 90 vols. is available via tolstoy.ru. Text of and commentary on The Death of Ivan Il’ich (Russian title, Smert’ Ivana ll’icha) is in volume 26 of this edition: text, pp. 61-113; variant readings, pp. 505-28; commentary (by L. P. Grossman), pp.679-91. The original Jubilee Edition has a note that the contents are free to reproduce.

The Death of Ivan Ilych. In Tolstoy’s Short Fiction, edited and with revised translations by Michael R. Katz, 123-67. New York: W. W. Norton & Co.,1991. Of the many translations of The Death of Ivan Il’ich currently available, this edition, originally translated by Louise and Aylmer Maude, provides the best text for study. It provides a translation of the text by persons who were closely acquainted with Tolstoi and who had the benefit of his advice with respect to the translation of difficult passages. Their work has been further improved by the revisions of the editor. The Norton edition also contains a helpful supplement of scholarly materials, including extracts from Tolstoi’s personal papers and letters, a selection of scholarly articles on Tolstoi’s short fiction, a chronology of his life and works, and a selected bibliography. The Maude translation as originally published can be found on Wikisource.

Tolstoy’s Letters, edited and translated by R. F. Christian. 2 vols. New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1978.

Tolstoy’s Diaries, edited and translated by R. F. Christian. 2 vols. New York: Scribner Press, 1985.

Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoĭ: Materialy k biografii s 1886 po 1892 g. (Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy: Materials towards a biography 1886-1892), L. D. Gromova-Opulʹskaia. Moskva: Izd-vo Akademii nauk SSSR, 1979. A compendious documentary record of Tolstoy’s literary and other activities between 1886 and 1892, the period in which The Death of Ivan Ilich was finished and first published.

Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoĭ: Materialy k biografii s 1881 po 1885 g. (Lev Nikolaevich Tolstoy: Materials towards a biography 1881-1885), N. N. Gusev, Moskva: Izd-vo Akademii nauk SSSR, 1970. A compendious documentary record of Tolstoy’s literary and other activities between 1881 and 1885, the period in which The Death of Ivan Ilich was begun and largely written.

Смерть Ивана Ильича (The Death of Ivan Ilyich). Michael Beresford (ed.). Series: The Library of Russian Classics. Chicago: Russian Language Specialties [Bradda Books], 1966. An excellent study version of the text, fully stressed, heavily annotated, and with Russian to English dictionary of the words used in the text.

Lev Tolstoi. Повести и рассказы: книга для чтения с комментариями на английском языке (Tales and Stories: A Book for Reading with Commentaries in English), E. G. Babaev (ed.). Moskva: Russkiĭ iazyk, 1978. A study version of the texts of several of Tolstoy’s stories, fully stressed and with commentary.