Culture · 6 pages · 12 min
Why page numbers are a navigation tool
A page number is an address inside the book, so a reader can leave and return.
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From the opening
A page number gives a single page a stable address inside one copy of a book, so a passage can be found again without rereading from the start. It is a tool for moving through the physical object, not a part of the sentence it sits above. The opening covers an address for one page, folios, signatures, and editions, and why two copies disagree.
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Inside
- An address for one page
- Folios, signatures, and editions
- Why two copies disagree
- What a citation is pointing at
- Where the idea stops applying
- A distinction worth keeping
Sources
- Pagination as a reader's address in a printed edition
- Signature marks as a binder's sequence rather than a reader's