A half title page carries the book's main title and nothing else. It is page i, the very first page. The full title page comes two leaves later on page iii and carries the complete title, the subtitle, the author's name and the publisher's imprint. The half title is optional and increasingly cut; the title page is not.
Both always fall on a recto, the right-hand page, which by definition carries an odd page number.
What Appears on Each
Half title (page i). The main title only. Princeton University Press specifies "book main title only, no subtitle". No author, no publisher, no subtitle. Its verso, page ii, is often blank, though publishers sometimes use it for a series list or a list of the author's other works.
Title page (page iii). New Hart's Rules lists the minimum: "the complete title and subtitle of the work; a volume number, if any; the name of the author or editor; the publisher's name (called the imprint)." It may also carry a series title, a translator or illustrator credit, place of publication, a publisher's logo, and the date.
Title page verso (page iv). This is the copyright page. New Hart's Rules gives the full enumeration: "publisher's imprint; date of publication; publishing history; copyright line; copyright notice(s); assertion of moral rights; limitations on sales; cataloguing in publication data; ISBN; statements concerning performing rights; printer's name and location." See what goes on a copyright page.
Why the Half Title Exists
The reason is mechanical, not aesthetic, and it comes from a time when printing and binding were separate trades. Cornell University Press's account of the origin and survival of the half title is the clearest: a book left the printer as an unbound block and might sit that way for some time, so the leading leaf identified the volume and protected the title page and frontispiece beneath it from dirt and damage. There was a second use as well. When valuable books were chained to shelves with the fore-edge outward, the leaf was trimmed and pasted so the title showed on the exposed edge.
Neither purpose survives. Books arrive bound, and Cornell's verdict is blunt: as publishers work to keep books affordable, "the bastard title seems to be going the way of the dinosaur."
Is the Half Title Still Standard?
No, and two authorities say so independently.
New Hart's Rules states directly that "not all books now have a half-title, and it may sometimes be dispensed with as a space-saving measure". Cornell University Press describes it as declining for cost reasons.
The mechanism behind that is worth understanding, because it explains why your printer might remove one. Books are printed in signatures, so the page count must come out to an even working. When a book runs slightly over, the cheapest fix is to shorten the front matter, and New Hart's Rules describes exactly this: the usual recourse is "sacrificing the luxury of blank versos" and, by extension, the pages that are least load-bearing. The half title is first in that queue.
A Note on "Bastard Title"
You will see the half title called a bastard title, usually presented as the correct technical term. It is not current publishing vocabulary. The 18th edition of the Chicago Manual of Style has no index entry for it at all, and New Hart's Rules uses only "half-title". It survives in antiquarian bookselling and the book trade rather than in production.
Doing This in Deckle
Deckle has a Title Page type, added from the + button at the top of the Binder under Front Matter. It generates the page from your book title, subtitle and author, or displays a full-bleed image if you supply one.
There is no half title page type. If you want one, add an ordinary document at the very top of your Draft folder containing only the title. Since Binder order is book order, position is all that matters.
Common Mistakes
- Putting the subtitle on the half title. Main title only.
- Treating the half title as mandatory. It is optional and is the first page cut when the page count needs trimming.
- Calling it a bastard title in a modern production context. Chicago's current edition does not use the term.
- Putting the author's name on the half title. That belongs on the full title page.
- Expecting the half title on page i in an ebook. Reflowable formats have no fixed pages, and New Hart's Rules notes recto and verso stop being meaningful there.
FAQ
Q: Do I need a half title in a self-published book? A: No. It is a convention of trade publishing, it costs you two pages, and both Oxford and Cornell describe it as optional and declining.
Q: What goes on the back of the half title? A: Usually nothing. Sometimes a series list or a list of other books by the same author.
Q: Why is the title page on page iii rather than page ii? A: Because page ii is the half title's verso. The title page opens the next leaf, keeping it on a recto.
Q: Does the half title get a page number? A: It has one, page i, but it is not printed. Suppressed numbers are called blind folios, and New Hart's Rules lists the half title, title, imprint, dedication and epigraph pages as carrying none.
Q: What is a frontispiece? A: An illustration facing the title page, printed on the verso opposite it. Where a book has one, it usually occupies page ii. See what is a frontispiece.