How to prove that a paper published with a particular English transliteration of my Russian name is mine?
As a possible solution if you are still worried about it: Get an ORCID account.
They basically created an ID, a DOI for researchers. If you link your publications to your ORC-ID, you don't need to worry if your name is very common (e.g. John Smith) or if someone misspelled your name.
Your question has a lengthy introduction, but finally:
If at some point I will need to prove the authorship of a certain publication that bears a name slightly, or significantly different from what is in my documents, will that be a problem?
No. A slight difference that can be explained by differences in transliteration is not a problem. This is not a court case, people working in academia are human. Some people even change their name completely (in some cultures this was or is common upon marriage) and still they can list articles under both names on their CV.
I'm not sure exactly what you mean by significantly different because that doesn't apply here. Just use the transliteration you prefer.
As mentioned in other questions, there’s no need at all for your academic name to match your legal name as indicated on a passport. So go wild.
More generally, Евгений, I would suggest that you take pride in your name, and maybe challenge the Eurocentrism/US-centrism of science a bit by using your original name in its original spelling. — At least in addition to a Latinised version.
I have mentioned elsewhere that this is unusual: publishers in particular (but also employers etc) really have trouble dealing with names that contain non-ASCII characters, among other things. But this is actually a shame: Own your heritage, and don’t let other peoples’ cultural insensitivity force you to forego it completely.
There’s obviously a balance to be struck between practicality and idealism but don’t make it too easy for people to become lazy with foreign names. On a personal note, I find it rather rude how little regard is often paid in the Western world to original names. Science has a diversity problem, and hiding non-Western culture sweeps this problem under the carpet.
Here’s my recommendation in full:
- On your PhD thesis, use your original name and add your preferred Latinised spelling (e.g. Yevgeny) in parentheses.
- In publications and when dealing with employers, at least try to make them use your original spelling alongside your preferred Latinised spelling. Don’t be nasty about it but at least make them realise that they’re inconveniencing you.
- Use a consistent Latinised spelling.
- Acquire an ORCID — though, to be honest, its usefulness at the moment is vastly overrated. Most publishers (in my field) flat out ignore it.
These are my recommendations. But the decision which spelling of your name to use is of course yours — you have the interpretive authority regarding your own name. Just don’t let that decision be taken away from you by other peoples’ inflexibility and lack of consideration.
Anecdote time: Don Knuth, one of the most eminent computer scientists, is one of the few authors to use the original spelling of names throughout the bibliography in his The Art of Computer Programming. This means Kyrillic, Japanese, Chinese etc. letters. I’ve done the same in my PhD thesis where I could find the original spelling.