Chicago Author-Date with Letter

Ayerbender
I am citing some letters by John Adams in Chicago author-date. Unfortunately, the "letter" style seems not to order author and date properly in bibliography. Instead, the date is randomly thrust in the middle. For example:

Adams, John. 2011. Revolutionary Writings: 1755–1775. Edited by Gordon S. Wood. New York: The Library of America.
Adams, John. Letter to The Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay. 1775a. “Novanglus No. IV,” February 13, 1775.
Adams, John. Letter to The Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay. 1775b. “Novanglus No. VII,” March 6, 1775.

How do I fix this so that the result instead is?

Adams, John. 2011. Revolutionary Writings: 1755–1775. Edited by Gordon S. Wood. New York: The Library of America.
Adams, John. 1775a. Letter to The Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay. “Novanglus No. IV,” February 13, 1775.
Adams, John. 1775b. Letter to The Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay. “Novanglus No. VII,” March 6, 1775.

Similarly, "presentation" also formats weirdly:

Grenville, George. 1765. “Speech in Support of the Stamp Act.” February 6.

Instead of: Grenville, George. 1765. “Speech in Support of the Stamp Act.” OR Grenville, George. 1765. “Speech in Support of the Stamp Act.” February 6, 1765.

Thanks!
  • adamsmith
    Can you test with the 18th edition (draft) style here: https://github.com/citation-style-language/styles/raw/e13de7f5cc39e04f1fff35cd670135314b9b1a55/chicago-author-date.csl
  • dunning
    I haven’t made it yet to that section of the manual; right now, only APA distinguishes between published and unpublished letters.
  • Ayerbender
    @Adamsmith, thank you! Didn't know the 18th ed. was out

    The result is doesn't fully fix the issue, but it does remove the excess dates:

    Adams, John. 2011. Revolutionary Writings: 1755–1775. Edited by Gordon S. Wood. The Library of America.
    Adams, John. Personal communication to The Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay. February 13, 1775a. “Novanglus No. IV.”
    Adams, John. Personal communication to The Inhabitants of the Colony of Massachusetts-Bay. March 6, 1775b. “Novanglus No. VII.”

    I also would rather retain "letter" than change to "personal communication". Is that possible?
  • dunning
    edited 7 days ago
    I have reviewed the guidance for citing a published letter in CMOS 14.13 and have worked out a way to achieve it by using the Extra field.

    Examples:
    Adams, Henry to Charles Milnes Gaskell, Baden, September 22, 1867. In Letters of Henry Adams (1858–1918), edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford, 133–34. Houghton Mifflin, 1930–1938.

    Adams, Henry to Charles Milnes Gaskell, Baden. September 22, 1867. In Letters of Henry Adams (1858–1918), edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford, 133–34. Houghton Mifflin, 1930–1938.
    https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u254032/gmeg8kcmt5tqqne3crnp.png
    Jackson, Paulina to John Pepys Junior, October 3, 1676. In The Letters of Samuel Pepys and His Family Circle, edited by Helen Truesdell Heath, no. 42. Clarendon Press, 1955.

    Jackson, Paulina to John Pepys Junior. October 3, 1676. In The Letters of Samuel Pepys and His Family Circle, edited by Helen Truesdell Heath, no. 42. Clarendon Press, 1955.
    https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u254032/194eu9r5z2lqlvwi5ie6.png
    White, E. B. to Harold Ross, memorandum, May 2, 1946. In Letters of E. B. White, edited by Dorothy Lobrano Guth, 273. Harper and Row, 1975.

    White, E. B. to Harold Ross, memorandum. May 2, 1946. In Letters of E. B. White, edited by Dorothy Lobrano Guth, 273. Harper and Row, 1975.
    https://s3.amazonaws.com/zotero.org/images/forums/u254032/9yrniei6olcb8mvo9e6k.png

    The changes are in my draft revision (updated since the version that @adamsmith provided earlier):

    https://github.com/citation-style-language/styles/pull/7424

    This approach also works with the APA and MHRA styles (though I need to fix a few problems with the latter).
  • dunning
    edited 7 days ago
    I should point out that the above is designed more around the needs of the full-note style. In author–date style, the CMOS 14.13 calls for a citation of the collection as a whole:
    In the author-date system, letters in published collections should be cited by the date of the collection. The dates of individual correspondence should be incorporated into the text.

    Adams, Henry. 1930. Letters of Henry Adams, 1858–1891. Edited by Worthington Chauncey Ford. Houghton Mifflin.
    White, E. B. 1976. Letters of E. B. White. Edited by Dorothy Lobrano Guth. Harper & Row.

    In a letter to Charles Milnes Gaskell from London, March 30, 1868 (Adams 1930, 141), Adams wrote . . .
    White (1976, 273) sent Ross an interoffice memo on May 2, 1946, pointing out that . . .
    Lacking guidance for individual letters in author–date, for now I have unusually placed the full date in the primary position – unless @adamsmith has a better idea?
  • Ayerbender
    edited 2 days ago
    Thanks! That approach [giving the date each instance] is way too unwieldy for some of these letters [eg famous titled letters like the Novanglus ones]. I suppose for these letters, I can just treat them as books or book sections in that case.

    EDIT: the date issue was because I filled it in wrong
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