The Collected Works of Justice Holmes : Complete Public Writings and Selected Judicial Opinions of Oliver Wendell Holmes

Holmes wrote more than than 2200 judicial opinions, as well as hundreds of reviews, essays, articles and speeches.

This edition consists of three volumes of all of Holmes's non-judicial writings intended for publication or for an audience.

Drawing from various sources, Novick concludes a project started in 1932, just before Holmes's death, in order to publish this comprehensive edition of Holmes's writing.

Novick's efforts have produced this researched collection of works covering 76 years, from an essay written by Holmes as a Harvard sophomore in 1858 to a letter written shortly before Holmes's death in 1935. Volume One includes the youthful writings: undergraduate essays, poems, addresses, his Civil War writings and letters, including obituaries of soldiers who served with him in the 10th Massachusetts Volunteers.

Volume One also includes the digests, articles, comments and book notices Holmes wrote anonymously for the nation's first modern law review, the "American Law Review", from 1867 to 1873.

These writings chart the beginnings of Holmes's attempt to shape a scientific study of law. Volume Two contains Holmes's landmark essay notes and annotations to "Kent's Commentaries on American Law", the leading legal treatise of the age. Volume Three includes the complete text of "The Common Law", with the text of "Lecture XII", the concluding chapter omitted from the book and believed to have been lost, and Holmes's revisions for an unpublished new edition.

Framing it all are articles from the "American Law Review" and the texts of the "Lowell Lectures" that were intellectual drafts of Holmes's masterwork.

Also in this volume are the "Speeches" (1913), uncollected and unpublished addresses, and other writings.