My fiancee works in a bookstore… and as you all have probably noticed every book is bound differently. She gets people returning books however that have been published where the outside edges of the books (the pages opposite of the spine) are not even… but ragged or not smooth like the top of edges of the pages… is there a reason why books are published in this form? She wants a good reason to tell the customers who feel that it looks sloppy and unprofessional… please advise… thanks.
I’m interested to know the answer to this question, too…I’ve passed up buying books at B&N because the edition they had on the shelves had what I can only describe as an “in and out” page cut on the long edge. There will be sections of pages that are maybe 1/4" longer than the surrounding pages, and it will alternate back and forth across the span of pages.
Is this intentional? If so, why? It looks terrible, and if I’m going to spend $30 on a hardcover book, I want the pages to be cut cleanly.
Actually, it is done on purpose and is usually up to the author. Some authors want to have something the catches the eye, and obviously, it does. The pages rough cut sometimes to give a desired effect, some say it makes the pages easier to turn, but I assure you it is up to the pub house, and or author to decide on this feature in a newly published book.
I know there is a word for it, but it escapes me at the moment. My wife works for a large pub house in the North East and has commented on this many times.
This is really funny, considering that it’s done to give snob value to the books!
Books are made by printing a number of pages of once, usually 16 or 32, onto a large sheet of paper, which is then folded in the proper manner so that the pages come out in order. Each of these folded sheets is called a signature. A bound book takes a bunch of signatures and puts them together.
In the beginning of printing, there was no way to do automated cutting of the edges of signatures. When the book was purchased, the buyer would literally take a knife and slice the folds so that the pages could be opened and read. This would create the characteristic ragged edge. Because the folds and the signatures would usually be slightly off true, you would also get varying widths so that some pages would stick out from the others.
A book that was purchased and never opened would remain noticeably “uncut.” Rich people would often buy books and display them without bothering to read them. A ragged edge showed that the book was considered worthy to have been read.
Today, of course, everything can be done automatically and perfectly. Ragged edges are an affectation. But they are meant to imply that the book is really high-class, something so important and meaningful that nobody would leave it sitting on a shelf.
So “sloppy and unprofessional” is the exact opposite of the intended connotation. If somebody who works in a bookstore doesn’t know this, then you can see why most publishers don’t do this much anymore.