The bibliophile's glossary
Offprint
Copies of an article or chapter from a periodical or collective volume, printed separately from the same setting of type, often with new pagination and sewn under their own wrappers, given to the author for distribution. Rare by nature, sometimes inscribed, the offprint may represent the earliest independent form of a text, preceding the book itself.
The practice of the offprint emerged with the learned journals of the eighteenth century and became widespread in the nineteenth: while the journal's formes were still set, the printer would pull a few dozen copies of the article alone, sometimes repaginating from 1, adding a title and a wrapper, and handing them to the author, who sent them to his peers. The sciences made them their currency of exchange — the offprints of Pasteur, Poincaré or Marie Curie circulated between laboratories — and literature adopted them too: poems and short stories published in journals such as Lemerre, the Mercure de France or the Nouvelle Revue française have their offprints, which bibliographers record because they often precede the book.
For the bookseller, an offprint is described by its journal of origin, its date, its pagination (retained from the journal or its own), its wrapper, its print run if known and, where applicable, any inscription it bears: when there is one, it is the dedication that makes the piece, and an inscribed scientific offprint is an association piece in the same way as a letter. For literary texts, Talvart and Place or author bibliographies indicate whether the offprint counts as the first edition; an offprint of a pre-original printing, predating the volume, is sometimes the true first edition of the text, albeit in a minute print run. The consistency between the date of the journal and that of the offprint should be checked.
The offprint is often confused with the extract, which may be simply cut from the journal without a separate print run, and with the plaquette, an independent edition typeset anew. It is also confused with the re-issue or the reprint, which are later and distinct. Finally, an "offprint" lacking its own wrapper or repagination should be cautiously described as extracted leaves, and an added wrapper does not in itself make an offprint.
Related terms
Pre-original editionFirst editionReview copyNumbered copyCovers
Frequently asked questions
What is a tiré à part (offprint)?
It is a small number of copies of an article that appeared in a journal, printed separately from the same type formes, often repaginated and given a plain wrapper of their own, handed to the author for him to give away. In English, offprint.
Is an offprint a first edition?
When the text appears in a periodical before any volume publication, the offprint is the first independent form of the text: bibliographies describe it either as the first edition or as a separate printing of the pre-original periodical appearance. The date and pagination should be checked.
What determines the value of an offprint?
Its rarity, with a print run of only a few dozen copies, and, when present, its inscription: a scientific offprint inscribed by a scholar to a colleague is a highly sought-after piece.