Title Pages in Books
The title page (as distinct from the cover) is one of the most important parts of the "front matter" or "preliminaries" of a book, as the data on it and its verso (together known as the "title leaf") are used to establish the "title proper and usually, though not necessarily, the statement of responsibility and the data relating to publication". This determines the way the book is cited in library catalogs and academic references.
Ideally the title page shows the title of the work, the person or body responsible for its intellectual content, the place of publication, the name of the publisher and the year of publication. Particularly in paperback editions it may contain a shorter title than the cover or lack a descriptive subtitle. Further information about the publication of the book, including its copyright, is frequently printed on the verso of the title page. Also often included there are the ISBN and a printers key, also known as the number line, which indicates the printing status.
The first printed books or incunabula did not have title pages. The text would begin on the first page, and the book would have to be identified by the initial words or incipit.
Read more about this topic: Title Page
Famous quotes containing the words title, pages and/or books:
“And Reason kens he herits in
A haunted house. Tenants unknown
Assert their squalid lease of sin
With earlier title than his own.”
—Robert Bridges (1844–1930)
“I am carrying out my plan, so long formulated, of keeping a journal. What I most keenly wish is not to forget that I am writing for myself alone. Thus I shall always tell the truth, I hope, and thus I shall improve myself. These pages will reproach me for my changes of mind.”
—Eugène Delacroix (1798–1863)
“I am an inveterate homemaker, it is at once my pleasure, my recreation, and my handicap. Were I a man, my books would have been written in leisure, protected by a wife and a secretary and various household officials. As it is, being a woman, my work has had to be done between bouts of homemaking.”
—Pearl S. Buck (1892–1973)