[sub]if this has been asked before, please forgive me, the page crashes every time I use the search page [/sub]
Many books start the story/ text on page one, but it seems like nearly as many start on 3, 7, 11 or so on. A few books I’ve seen have started on a number higher than counting all the blank pages, the copy-right and title page could account for as well, so that’s even odder.
What purpose is served by counting (or whatever it is they’re doing) the pages before the story begins? And if it’s to some advantage, why don’t all books number the pages that way?
WAG here, but it could be that, in the case of a reprint (new edition, or hardback reprinted as a paperback), they’re keeping the same text on the same-numbered pages, even though they might have a different number of blank pages at the beginning.
Page numbering starts after one in first edition hardbacks, so Thudlow Boink’s WAG is incorrect.
My WAG, on the other hand, comes from the use of signatures. Signatures are large sheets of paper that are folded to make bundles of (usually) 32 pages that are put through the presses all together. The various signatures are sewn together to make a hardback book. (Glued together for softbacks.)
It’s probably easier for all concerned in the publishing process to think of the first page of the first signature as page 1. What is actually on that page will vary greatly from book to book, depending on the use of forewards, intros, contents pages, dedications, acknowledgements, and all the other various apparati.
Also, when a book is divided into sections, the section title will often be designated page 1 but the actual number won’t show on it, making the first text page, page 3.
Or the art director will have a fit of creativity.
In the US, “front matter” (that is, title pages, copyright pages, tables of content, acknowledgements, etc.) is usually numbered with lowercase roman numerals; page i is almost always the first (right-hand) page after the endpaper. Arabic numerals almost always start on the first (always right-hand) page of main text. Introductions and prologues are usually, but not always, included with “main text” per numbering. According to The Chicago Manual of Style, “the practice [of numbering front matter separately] is due partly to tradition and partly to expedience…” – the latter because it can be difficult to make an accurate table of contents before you’ve numbered the pages it refers to, especially in pre-digital publishing. (See CMS 1.100, p. 40, 14th ed.)
If there is a “half-title” page or a chapter-title page after all the front matter but immediately before the first page of real text, it’s usually numbered as page 1. Then page 2 (the left-handed backside of page 1) is blank; page 3 begins the sentences of the text. If you have a half-title page AND a chapter-title page, then the first sentence may end up on page 5… and so on.
HOWEVER: books published in Great Britain typically call the first half-title page (often the first page with any printing on it) 1 and go consecutively from there all the way through.
Can you give any examples? I think you may find that it’s very rare. A repaired library book might be missing some pages that were tattered and didn’t have any essential info on them, and so were simply cut out.
Signatures usually have nothing to do with page numbering, AFAIK. They determine how many physical pages there are in the book, though. (Also, OT, signatures often make larger or smaller numbers of pages than 32. 64 is becoming common for paperbacks, IIRC, and we often use 16 in big Teachers’ Edition textooks; great big coffee-table art books may use 8.)
This is often but not always true: there are lots of glued hardbacks – sometimes called “perfectbound,” such hardbacks used to fall apart relatively quickly, but with advances in glue technology in the last decade or two, they’re increasingly durable – and a few sewn softcovers. Sewn signatures are getting rarer as they are more labor-intensive and harder to automate than glued sigs.
Interestingly, glued hardbacks still have a little bit of (usually striped) ribbon glued into the ends where the signatures meet the cover on the spine. It’s fake, I tell ya! Fake! A scam!
In the US, front matter is almost never numbered in any fashion. There is absolutely no consistency as to how the prefaces, acknowledgements, and intros etc. are presented. They may be in lowercase roman, numbered with arabic numerals, or may not be numbered at all. I just dug into the pile of books alongside my desk and found examples of all three.
And yes, having had to index a book, let me tell you that the unbound galleys had better have the right numbering before the book is put into production.
I guess a real answer to the OP would be, “The numbering varies, sometimes according to the traditions the particular publisher follows, sometimes for rational reasons, and sometimes by accident. Getting all publishers to switch to doing this in the same (rational) way would require the services of a skilled cat herder.”
