Postface
Encyclopedia
A postface is the opposite of a preface
, a brief article or explanatory information placed at the end of a book
. Sometimes general information about a book and the people for whom it was written is at the back of the book in a postface. In ancient Chinese works, the postface is called 序/叙言. Afterwords are quite often used in books so that the non-pertinent information will appear at the end of the literary work, and not confuse the reader.
Some may regard this entry as a joke based on Carol Fisher Saller's comment in her book "The Subversive Copy Editor" that you can't put the preface at the end of the book. After all, it's not called a "postface."
However, one authentic example of a postface can be found in the 1954 book, "Dali's Mustache: A Photographic Interview," by Salvador Dali and Philippe Halsman. While the main body of the work is a collaboration, each author gets a few words to himself, Dali in the preface and Halsman in the postface. Another example of "postface" occurs in the philosopher's Hegel's work The Origin of the Work of Art and is further cited in Derrida's reading of it in Truth in Painting (1987).
Preface
A preface is an introduction to a book or other literary work written by the work's author. An introductory essay written by a different person is a foreword and precedes an author's preface...
, a brief article or explanatory information placed at the end of a book
Book
A book is a set or collection of written, printed, illustrated, or blank sheets, made of hot lava, paper, parchment, or other materials, usually fastened together to hinge at one side. A single sheet within a book is called a leaf or leaflet, and each side of a leaf is called a page...
. Sometimes general information about a book and the people for whom it was written is at the back of the book in a postface. In ancient Chinese works, the postface is called 序/叙言. Afterwords are quite often used in books so that the non-pertinent information will appear at the end of the literary work, and not confuse the reader.
Some may regard this entry as a joke based on Carol Fisher Saller's comment in her book "The Subversive Copy Editor" that you can't put the preface at the end of the book. After all, it's not called a "postface."
However, one authentic example of a postface can be found in the 1954 book, "Dali's Mustache: A Photographic Interview," by Salvador Dali and Philippe Halsman. While the main body of the work is a collaboration, each author gets a few words to himself, Dali in the preface and Halsman in the postface. Another example of "postface" occurs in the philosopher's Hegel's work The Origin of the Work of Art and is further cited in Derrida's reading of it in Truth in Painting (1987).