Tristram Shandy was written in five installments and published in these segments:
Book 1 and Book 2: December 1759
Book 3 and Book 4: January 1761
Book 5 and Book 6: December 1761
Book 7 and Book 8: January 1765
Book 9: January 1767
The following notes are based on this first London edition, considered the most authoritative. The quotes preserve the punctuation of this edition, an important matter because the great use Sterne makes of dashes gives us a good idea of how Tristram Shandy should sound. These dashes are more effective for his purposes than the standard use of periods, commas, and semicolons, for as he says, "Writing, when properly managed . . . is but a different name for conversation."
