What is the function of preface in books?

Function: The preface is an article that introduces and comments a book or an article, and at the same time explains the writing or publishing intention, arrangement style or author's situation of the book. , including comments on the author and research and clarification on related issues. In ancient times, it was listed at the end of the book, called "Postscript", also called "Preface and Postscript". These two styles are similar, so they are collectively called Preface and Postscript.

There are two situations:

1, written by the author himself, is called "preface", which mostly explains its content, writing reason, process, theme and characteristics;

The preface written by others is called "preface", which introduces and comments on the ideological content and artistic characteristics of the book.

Extended data

The difference between preface and introduction:

Because the preface and preface are placed at the beginning of the volume, they are all a general introduction to the content of the book or the purpose and process of writing. Many people think that preface is a kind of preface, but there is a big difference between them. From the extension of the two, the preface has a wide range of applications, which can be used in both literary works, such as the preface to Scream, and academic works, such as the preface to Ancient Chinese by Mr. Wang Li.

The introduction can only be used in academic works. Sometimes academic works can have both a preface and an introduction, with the preface in front and the introduction behind. They have different functions and perform their respective duties. For example, the first draft of the History of Contemporary Literature in China has a preface before the article and an introduction at the beginning.

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