Paratext

In literary interpretation, paratext is material that surrounds a published main text (e.g., the story, non-fiction description, poems, etc.) supplied by the authors, editors, printers, and publishers. These added elements form a frame for the main text, and can change the reception of a text or its interpretation by the public. In Gérard Genette's terminology, paratext is a subtype of transtextuality (See the overview on the French Wikipedia page paratexte).

Paratext is most often associated with books, as they typically include a cover (with associated cover art), title, front matter (dedication, opening information, foreword, epigraph), back matter (endpapers, indexes, and colophons), and many other materials not crafted by the author. Other editorial decisions can also fall into the category of paratext, such as the formatting or typography. Paratext functions to inform and guide the reader, to promote the (meta)text, and to shape appearance.

Authors do not always receive the final say about paratextual materials. The 2009 young adult novel Liar, for example, was initially published with an image of a white girl on the cover, although the text identifies the narrator of the story as black.

The concept of paratext is closely related to the concept of hypotext, which is the earlier text that serves as a source for the current text."Genette's term was hypertextuality".

Theory

Literary theorist Gérard Genette defines paratext as those things in a published work that accompany the text, things such as the author's name, the title, preface or introduction, or illustrations.