Henry David Thoreau
Selected Chronology of Thoreau's Writings
1827 Thoreau wrote student essay "The Seasons," his earliest known composition
1837 Thoreau began to keep a journal
First published piece, obituary notice of Anna Jones, appeared in Concord newspaper Yeoman's Gazette
1840 Published pieces in The Dial (poem "Sympathy"; essay "Aulus Perseus Flaccus")
1841 Published poetry in The Dial ("Stanzas," "Sic Vita," "Friendship")
1842 Published essay ("Natural History of Massachusetts") and poems (including "To the Maiden in the East") in The Dial
1843 Published in Boston Miscellany ("A Walk to Wachusett"), in The United States Magazine and Democratic Review (essay and book review), and in The Dial (poems, including "Smoke"; essays, including "A Winter Walk"; and selections in translation from Oriental literature and from Chaucer)
1844 Published lecture extracts ("Homer, Ossian, Chaucer"), essay ("Herald of Freedom"), and translations in The Dial
1845 Published letter ("Wendell Phillips Before the Concord Lyceum") in The Liberator
1847 Published "Thomas Carlyle and His Works" in Graham's Magazine
1848 Published "Ktaadn and the Maine Woods" in The Union Magazine
1849 A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers appeared (Boston: James Munroe)
Published "Resistance to Civil Government" in Elizabeth Palmer Peabody's Aesthetic Papers
1852 Published what would later be parts of Walden in Sartain's Union Magazine
1853 Published "Excursions to Canada" in Putnam's Monthly Magazine
1854 Published in New York Daily Tribune (selections from soon-to-be-published Walden) and in The Liberator ("Slavery in Massachusetts")
Walden; or, Life in the Woods appeared (Boston: Ticknor and Fields)
1855 Published "Cape Cod" in Putnam's Monthly Magazine
1858 Published "Chesuncook" in Atlantic Monthly
1860 Published in The Liberator ("The Last Days of John Brown") and in New York Daily Tribune ("The Succession of Forest Trees")
1862 "Walking," "Autumnal Tints," and "Wild Apples" published posthumously in Atlantic Monthly
1863 Previously unpublished pieces appeared in The Commonwealth and Atlantic Monthly ("Life Without Principle" and "Night and Moonlight," both in Atlantic)
Excursions (edited by Sophia Thoreau and Emerson) appeared (Boston: Ticknor and Fields)
1864 Journal extracts published in The Commonwealth, "The Wellfleet Oysterman" and "The Highland Light" in Atlantic Monthly
The Maine Woods (edited by Sophia Thoreau and Ellery Channing) appeared (Boston: Ticknor and Fields)
1865 Cape Cod (edited by Sophia Thoreau and Channing) appeared (Boston: Ticknor and Fields)
Letters to Various Persons (edited by Emerson) appeared (Boston: Ticknor and Fields)
1866 A Yankee in Canada, with Anti-Slavery and Reform Papers (edited by Sophia Thoreau and Channing) appeared (Boston: Ticknor and Fields)
1878 Extracts from journals published in Atlantic Monthly
1881 Early Spring in Massachusetts (edited from journals by H.G.O. Blake) appeared (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin)
1884 Summer (edited by Blake from journals) appeared (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin)
1888 Winter (edited by Blake from journals) appeared (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin)
1892 Autumn (edited by Blake from journals) appeared (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin)
1894 Familiar Letters of Henry David Thoreau (edited by F.B. Sanborn) published (Cambridge: Riverside Press)
Riverside Edition of collected writings (11 volumes, including the 4 volumes from the journals as edited by Blake) published (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin)
1895 Poems of Nature (edited by Sanborn) published (London: John Lane; Boston and New York: Houghton, Mifflin)
1905 Journal extracts appeared in Atlantic Monthly
1906 Walden and Manuscript Editions of collected writings (20 volumes, including the 14-volume Journal) published (Boston: Houghton, Mifflin)
1971 First volume of "Princeton Edition" of collected writings published (publication ongoing to date)