The title-page in eighteenth century grammar books

Abstract

Theories of paratext have focused primarily on fiction texts, following Gerard Genette's Paratexts (1997). Recent work in the field of historical sociolinguistics has paid increasing attention to grammar writing, in particular that from the eighteenth century. This study aims to contribute to both areas of research, and to book history in general, by examining the linguistic design of the title-page, one of the richest paratextual elements, in eighteenthcentury grammar books, a type of non-fiction text that played a vital role in the education and print culture of that century. The analysis is based on a corpus of title-pages in English grammars, leading to a better understanding of which elements of a book's title-page, which pedagogical method and which grammar contents were considered essential to present to readers directly. The choice of lexicon will also reveal to what extent a prescriptive tone was overtly presented to readers as a selling point.