How to Cite Multiple Works by the Same Author in a Compilation
by Tyler Krupa
This week, we address how to cite multiple works by the same author that appear in a compilation. As noted in a recent post to our blog, when constructing your reference list, you should cite the edition or volume that you read and are relying on for your information. Therefore, if you are writing a literature review and your source is an anthology, this is the source that you should include in the reference list and cite in the text (even if the works you are citing have been published previously or can be accessed online). For example, if you want to compare two different John Cheever stories from this anthology in your paper, then you need to include a separate reference for each one of them (even though they were obtained from the same source). The references would be formatted as follows:
| Cheever, J. (1995a). The enormous radio. In R. V. Cassill (Ed.), The Norton anthology of short fiction (5th ed., pp. 182–191). New York, NY: Norton. (Original work published 1947)
Cheever, J. (1995b). The five-forty-eight. In R. V. Cassill (Ed.), The Norton anthology of short fiction (5th ed., pp. 191–202). New York, NY: Norton. (Original work published 1954) |
Note that in both references, in addition to including the year that the anthology was published, you need to include the year that the original work was published in parentheses at the end of the reference. Also note that because you have two “Cheever, 1995” references, “a” and “b” are needed after the anthology’s publication date—the references are then ordered by alphabetizing the short story titles (“enormous” comes before “five,” so the first reference is “1995a” and the second one is “1995b”; for additional information, see p. 182 in the sixth edition of the Publication Manual).
When citing these references in the text, both years are needed, with the published date of the original work coming first (see pp. 203–204 in the Publication Manual). Examples of text citations are included below:
| Cheever (1947/1995a) used foreshadowing to reveal . . .
The characters in Cheever’s (1954/1995b) story . . . |
We hope that these examples help you understand how to properly cite multiple works from a compilation in APA Style. If you still have questions regarding this topic, feel free to leave a comment.
