The complete works of an artist, writer, musician, group, etc., is a collection of all of their cultural works. For example, ''

Complete Works of Shakespeare ''Complete Works of William Shakespeare'' is the standard name given to any volume containing all the plays and poems of William Shakespeare. Some editions include several works that were not completely of Shakespeare's authorship (collaborativ ...

'' is an edition containing all the plays and poems of William Shakespeare. A ''Complete Works'' published edition of a text corpus is normally accompanied with additional information and critical apparatus. It may include notes, introduction, a biographical sketch, and may pay attention to textual variants. Similarly, the term body of work may be used to describe the entirety of the creative or academic output produced by a particular individual or unit.

Terminology

Complete works may be titled by a single word, "Works". "Collected works" is often treated as a synonym. A distinction began to be seen clearly in the second half of the 18th century. The Latin language equivalent ''Opera Omnia'' is still used in English, for example, to refer to the works of Galen or Leonhard Euler. German usage distinguishes :de:Gesamtwerk as a complete corpus, :de:Gesamtausgabe for a published edition of the works, and ''Gesammelte Werke'' or collected works that may be selective in some way. A contrasting term is "selected works", which is a collection of works chosen according to some criterion, e.g., by prominence, or as a representative selection.

Examples

*The first literary author to have "complete works" published, in the modern sense, has been identified as

Gerbrand Adriaenszoon Bredero Gerbrand Adriaenszoon Bredero (16 March 1585 – 23 August 1618) was a Dutch poet and playwright in the period known as the Dutch Golden Age. Life Gerbrand Adriaenszoon Bredero was born on 16 March 1585 in Amsterdam in the Dutch Republic, ...

, in 1637/8. *The first critical complete edition of a musical composer's works has been identified as '' Joh. Seb. Bach's Werke'' (of Johann Sebastian Bach) published 1851 to 1926 by the Bach Gesellschaft at Leipzig, in 46 volumes. *The ''

Opera Omnia Leonhard Euler ''Opera Omnia Leonhard Euler (Leonhardi Euleri Opera omnia)'' is the compilation of Leonhard Euler's scientific writings. The project of this compilation was undertaken by the Euler Committee of the Swiss Academy of Sciences, established in 1908, ...

'', a compilation of the works of the mathematician Leonhard Euler, began publication in 1911 and volumes were still being compiled for publication . *The Iwanami Shoten complete works of Natsume Sōseki, new edition, set up a Japanese model for complete works of other authors.

References

Publications Authority Works based on multiple works {{lit-stub