# Is "The Woodlanders" by Thomas Hardy a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Woodlanders by Thomas Hardy (Macmillan and Co., 1887) is identified by: First published in three volumes by Macmillan and Co.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- First published in three volumes by Macmillan and Co. in March 1887, after serialization in Macmillan's Magazine (May 1886-April 1887)
- Of the edition of 1,000 sets of sheets printed, only about 860 were bound up in the primary issue; the remaining sheets were later cased as a distinct remainder binding (Purdy)
- The primary binding is forest-green buckram-grain cloth with a rounded-corner frame blocked in black on the upper cover and in blind on the lower, spine lettered in gilt
- First-issue sets carry the publisher's advertisement leaf at the rear of volume I
- Publisher imprint reads Macmillan and Co.
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Thomas Hardy |
| Publisher | Macmillan and Co. |
| Year | 1887 |
| True first | — |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | First published in three volumes by Macmillan and Co. in March 1887, after serialization in Macmillan's Magazine (May 1886-April 1887) |
| Book-club edition exists? | — |

## Points of issue
First published in three volumes by Macmillan and Co. in March 1887, after serialization in Macmillan's Magazine (May 1886-April 1887). Of the edition of 1,000 sets of sheets printed, only about 860 were bound up in the primary issue; the remaining sheets were later cased as a distinct remainder binding (Purdy). The primary binding is forest-green buckram-grain cloth with a rounded-corner frame blocked in black on the upper cover and in blind on the lower, spine lettered in gilt. First-issue sets carry the publisher's advertisement leaf at the rear of volume I.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
Later one-volume Macmillan reprints and the collected 'Wessex Novels'/'Wessex Edition' sets carry Hardy's revised text and different title-page dating; only the three-volume 1887 set with the 1887 date is the first edition.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Woodlanders* by Thomas Hardy a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-woodlanders
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.