Modern commercial binding
There are various commercial techniques in use today. Today, most commercially produced books belong to one of four categories: · Hardcover binding. · Punch and bind · Thermally activated binding · Stitched or sewn binding A hardcover, hardbound book has rigid covers and is stitched in the spine. Looking from the top of the spine, the book can be seen to consist of a number of signatures bound together. When the book is opened in the middle of a signature, the binding threads are visible. Unusually large and heavy books are sometimes bound with wire. Methods of hardcover binding There are a number of methods used to bind hardcover books, from them: · Case binding is the most common type of hardcover binding for books. The pages are arranged in signatures and glued together into a "text block.". The text block is then attached to the cover or "case" which is made of cardboard covered with paper, cloth, vinyl or leather. This is also known as perfect binding, cloth binding, or edition binding. · Oversewing, where the signatures of the book start off as loose pages which are then clamped together. Small vertical holes are punched through the far left-hand edge of each signature, and then the signatures are sewn together with lock-stitches to form the text block. Oversewing is a very strong method of binding and can be done on books up to five inches thick. However, the margins of oversewn books are reduced and the pages will not lie flat when opened. · Sewing through the fold (also called Smyth sewn), where the signatures of the book are folded and stitched through the fold. The signatures are then sewn or glued together at the spine to form a text block. In contrast to oversewing, through-the-fold books have wide margins and can open completely flat. However, the text block of a sewn-through-the-fold book is not very secure, which can cause some signatures to come loose over time. Many varieties of sewing stitches exist, from basic links to complex decorative stitches. While Western books are generally sewn through holes punched along the fold, some Asian bindings, such as the Retchoso or Butterfly Stitch of Japan, use small slits instead of punched holes. · Double-fan adhesive binding starts off with two signatures of loose pages, which are run over a roller—"fanning" the pages—to apply a thin layer of glue to each page edge. Then the two signatures are perfectly aligned to form a text block, and glue edges of the text block are attached to a piece of cloth lining to form the spine. Double-fan adhesive bound books can open completely flat and have a wide margin. However, certain types of paper do not hold adhesive well, and, with wear and tear, the pages can come loose. (The text is borrowed and modified from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bookbinding: as of 25 January 2012)
Task 8. The book size is also an essential question. The size of a modern book is based on the printing area of a common flatbed press. Read the information below about different book sizes. Then open your bag and look at books that you have. Identify their size (You have 10 minutes for this task).
The most common book sizes are: · Quarto (4to): the sheet of paper is folded twice, forming four leaves (eight pages) approximately 30 cm tall. · Octavo (8vo): the most common size for current hardcover books. The sheet is folded three times into eight leaves (16 pages) up to 23 cm tall. · DuoDecimo (12mo): a size between 8vo and 16mo, up to 18 cm tall. · Sextodecimo (16mo): the sheet is folded four times, forming 16 leaves (32 pages) up to 15 cm tall.
The largest extant medieval manuscript in the world is Codex Gigas 92 × 50 × 22 cm. The world's largest book made of stone is in Kuthodaw Pagoda (Myanmar). The longest book title in the worlds is 670 words long.
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Small books can be called booklets.
