Editor: Professor T. H. Howard-Hill, University of South Carolina

Managing Editor: Travis Gordon

The Papers of the Bibliographical Society of America is published quarterly by the Society, 233 E. 70th Street, 5P, New York, NY 10021. Subscriptions are available only through membership in the Society. Dues are $65 per year or $20 per year for students providing proof of eligibility (a $15 postage surcharge is added for all non-US memberships). Back numbers are available from Periodicals Service Company, 11 Main Street, Germantown, NY 12526; e-mail: <psc@periodicals.com> or order directly from the PSC website at <http://www.periodicals.com/stock_e/b/ttl02303.html>.

Guidelines for Contributors

Contributions to the Papers may deal with books and manuscripts in any field, but should involve consideration of the book or manuscript (the physical object) as historical evidence, whether for establishing a text or illuminating the history of book production, publication, distribution, or collecting, or for other purposes. Studies of the printing, publishing, and allied trades are also welcome.

PBSA welcomes electronic submissions in WordPerfect, MS Word, or rich text format sent as email attachments. These should be sent directly to the editor at RalphCrane@msn.com. When the paper has been read and accepted for publication, the author may be asked to revise it in the light of readers' comments. When the typescript is close to final form, it will be copy-edited and returned (with author's queries) for the author to incorporate all changes in a final electronic version.

PBSA is composed in Adobe PageMaker. Proper preparation of your manuscript will greatly speed up our production process and reduce the occurrence of error. Therefore we strongly encourage you to submit your manuscript formatted as the notes below describe. If you have any questions regarding the file format, please contact Travis Gordon.

Use 12 pt. Times Roman, spaced 1.5 lines, consistently for text and notes; the typescript will be styled during composition. Please do NOT format your electronic text with headers or footers, except for centered pagination at the foot of each page. Use either footnotes or endnotes with consecutive superscript roman numbers in the text and normal text in the notes. Leave substantial space for copyediting at all points. (a) Leave margins of 1.5" or more at top, bottom and sides. (b) Indent long quotations.

If you are sending a printed copy, use only white bond or other plain-surfaced paper. Do not use “erasable” papers or other papers with coated surfaces.

Illustrations, tables, and figures: Do not embed these in your text. Provide captions for all illustrations in a separate list at the end of your text. Do not attempt to place these in your article. Please submit illustrations, etc. in separate electronic files, clearly labeled. For graphics files, the specifications are given below. Contact Travis Gordon if you have questions.

Follow the Chicago Manual of Style, 15^th edition, if in doubt about matters of general style. A recent issue of PBSA may provide a clearer guide to style.

In bibliographical collation or pagination statements, follow the Greg-Bowers formulary, but in all cases employ the option of bracketed letters or figures, not italics, to indicate inferred paging of signing (e.g., [27] p. and [A]₄, not 27 p. and A₄). Our typeface does not always allow clear distinction of italic from roman in isolated figures and letters. Ensure that ^r for recto and ^v for verso are superscripted.

Please do not copy the spelling of such standard bibliographies as STC and Wing. Ordinarily, old-spelling should be preserved in titles only when it is necessary to distinguish differently titled or spelled editions. Accidentals such as typography and & will be normalized. Do not use “Ltd.” or “plc.”, and spell out “Company” in publishers’ names.

After your typescript is copy-edited, you may receive the marked-up text to allow you to deal with authors’ queries and input the copy-editor’s alterations before the text is sent for composition. (This stage will not be necessary if the typescript you send follows these guidelines.) After the text is typeset, you will receive page proofs to check against your original, and a permission-to-publish form. Plan to handle these matters promptly so our issues may remain timely.

Format for Accompanying Illustrations

Although authors in the past submitted images for their illustrations as black-and-white photographs or other camera ready form, most authors today prefer to send digitized images. While there are a number of formats for these images, not all are acceptable for rendering plates for printing. Jpg, perhaps the most common format, and files produced by converting from jpgs, are usually not acceptable. PBSA requires files in tiff format with a minimum resolution of 600 dpi at print size. Since the file sizes frequently run to several megs, authors usually send them on CDs rather than attempting to email them as attachments. Contact the managing editor if you need assistance.

Offprints for Authors

Authors of articles appearing in PBSA receive six copies of the issue (reviewers receive three copies). The following table gives rates for those wishing to purchase additional copies of their contributions in the form of offprints. Requests for offprints should be made directly to Scott Vile at Ascensius Press, who can answer questions and arrange for payment. Orders must be placed at the time authors return their page proofs to the managing editor.

PBSA / Ascensius Press
Production Schedule

This page last updated on 12/16/08