Which words don't get capitalized in the title of a book?

Asked by occ (2226

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I was looking at this title:
Bottlemania: How Water Went on Sale and Why We Bought It
and it occurred to me that I’m not sure what the official rule for this is – why is “on” lower case but other short words like “we” and “it” are not – is it just the prepositions that are lower case? Or is there a more in-depth rule? I’ve always just tried to do what instinctively feels right – keep the prepositions in lower case – but maybe there’s a different rule at work? and while we’re at it – is lower case two words? or is it lowercase? Where’s Gailcalled when I need her?

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Topics: grammar, English, titles, capitalization

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Answers

And, or, of, with, to.

wizard (626

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John Gruber explained what he does for his Daring Fireball blog titles.

robmandu (5125

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There’s no official rule; it’s whatever the author / publisher decides. The first word, no matter what it is, will usually be capitalized. Articles and prepositions are usually lowercase if not the first word, and pronouns tend to be capitalized.

Wikipedia says both lower case and lowercase are correct (and also minuscule).

petethepothead (1886

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