The following volumes of The Writings of Herman Melville (Evanston and Chicago: Northwestern University Press and the Newberry Library) are abbreviated in the text and notes:
- C Correspondence, ed. Lynn Horth (1993).
- IP Israel Potter: His Fifty Years of Exile, ed. Harrison Hayford, Hershel Parker, and G. Thomas Tanselle (1982).
- J Journals, ed. Howard C. Horsford with Lynn Horth (1989).
- MD Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, ed. Harrison Hayford, Hershel Parker, and G. Thomas Tanselle (1988).
- P Pierre; or, The Ambiguities, ed. Harrison Hayford, Hershel Parker, and G. Thomas Tanselle (1971).
- PT The Piazza Tales and Other Prose Pieces, 1839–1860, ed. Harrison Hayford, Alma A. MacDougall, and G. Thomas Tanselle (1987).
- PP Published Poems, ed. Robert C. Ryan, Harrison Hayford, Alma MacDougall Reising, and G. Thomas Tanselle (2009).
- T Typee: A Peep at Polynesian Life, ed. Harrison Hayford, Hershel Parker, and G. Thomas Tanselle (1968).
- WJ White-Jacket, or The World in a Man-of-War, ed. Harrison Hayford, Hershel Parker, and G. Thomas Tanselle (1970).