# Is "The Gentleman from San Francisco (Господин из Сан-Франциско / Gospodin iz San-Frantsisko)" by Ivan Bunin (Ivan Alekseyevich Bunin) a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Gentleman from San Francisco (Господин из Сан-Франциско / Gospodin iz San-Frantsisko) by Ivan Bunin (Ivan Alekseyevich Bunin) (Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve, 1916 (first stand-alone book collection; text first printed 1915 in the Slovo anthology)) is identified by: The text's true first printing is periodical/anthology, not a book: the story debuted in the fifth "Slovo" (Слово / "Word") anthology, issued in Moscow by the Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve, dated 1915. Two "firsts" matter to collectors.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The text's true first printing is periodical/anthology, not a book: the story debuted in the fifth "Slovo" (Слово / "Word") anthology, issued in Moscow by the Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve, dated 1915
- The collectible first edition in book form under its own title is the author's-lifetime collection "Господин из Сан-Франциско. Произведения 1915–1916 г." (Moscow: Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve, 1916), 192 pp., approximately 23.5×16 cm, issued as a softcover in publisher's printed (letterpress) paper wrappers — not publisher's cloth
- Confirm the true first by the 1916 imprint of the Writers' Publishing Association in Moscow, the "Произведения 1915–1916 г." subtitle, and contents that include the title story alongside "Легкое дыхание" (Light Breathing), "Грамматика любви," "Аглая," "Казимир Станиславович," "Клаша," "Сын," and poems
- Because it is a Great-War / late-Imperial trade paperback, survival in the fragile original printed wrappers (uncut, unrestored) is the scarcity driver; rebound or wrapper-lacking copies are common and less desirable
- Publisher imprint reads Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Ivan Bunin (Ivan Alekseyevich Bunin) |
| Publisher | Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve |
| Year | 1916 (first stand-alone book collection; text first printed 1915 in the Slovo anthology) |
| True first | American edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | The text's true first printing is periodical/anthology, not a book: the story debuted in the fifth "Slovo" (Слово / "Word") anthology… |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
The text's true first printing is periodical/anthology, not a book: the story debuted in the fifth "Slovo" (Слово / "Word") anthology, issued in Moscow by the Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve, dated 1915. The collectible first edition in book form under its own title is the author's-lifetime collection "Господин из Сан-Франциско. Произведения 1915–1916 г." (Moscow: Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve, 1916), 192 pp., approximately 23.5×16 cm, issued as a softcover in publisher's printed (letterpress) paper wrappers — not publisher's cloth. Confirm the true first by the 1916 imprint of the Writers' Publishing Association in Moscow, the "Произведения 1915–1916 г." subtitle, and contents that include the title story alongside "Легкое дыхание" (Light Breathing), "Грамматика любви," "Аглая," "Казимир Станиславович," "Клаша," "Сын," and poems. Because it is a Great-War / late-Imperial trade paperback, survival in the fragile original printed wrappers (uncut, unrestored) is the scarcity driver; rebound or wrapper-lacking copies are common and less desirable.

## Is this the true first?
Two "firsts" matter to collectors. (1) The absolute first appearance of the text is the fifth "Slovo"/"Word" anthology (Kn-vo pisatelei v Moskve, Moscow, 1915) — a shared anthology, not a Bunin book. (2) The first edition as a stand-alone Bunin-titled book is "Господин из Сан-Франциско. Произведения 1915–1916 г." (same Moscow publisher, 1916). Serious buyers of the Russian original generally chase the 1916 book; purists also seek the 1915 Slovo No. 5 anthology as the genuine first printing. The first ENGLISH-language edition is "The Gentleman from San Francisco and Other Stories," Richmond (Surrey): The Hogarth Press (Leonard & Virginia Woolf), 1922 — translated by S. S. Koteliansky and Leonard Woolf, with the title story translated by Koteliansky and D. H. Lawrence (Woolmer 18). The first American edition followed from Thomas Seltzer, New York, 1923.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No mass-market book-club edition exists for the Russian original — this is a scarce late-Imperial Moscow imprint, so the trap is not a book club but modern reprints and print-on-demand facsimiles ("Russian Edition"/Nabu-type reprints of the 1916 collection) mistaken for the original; a genuine 1916 copy is letterpress-printed on period paper in fragile printed wrappers bearing the Knigoizdatel'stvo pisatelei v Moskve imprint. For the 1922 Hogarth first English edition, the key first-issue point is the tipped-in errata slip stating that owing to a mistake Mr. Lawrence's name was omitted from the title page (his name is absent from the title page of the true first); it was issued in patterned paper boards with printed white paper labels to spine and front cover, in a run of about 1,000 copies. Later Hogarth impressions/reissues and the 1923 American (Thomas Seltzer) edition are not the first English edition.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Gentleman from San Francisco (Господин из Сан-Франциско / Gospodin iz San-Frantsisko)* by Ivan Bunin (Ivan Alekseyevich Bunin) a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-gentleman-from-san-francisco
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.