Dedication (publishing)

A dedication, in publishing, is "the expression of friendly connection or thanks by the author towards another person," and it "has its own place on the dedication page," part of the front matter, "usually on the recto page after the main title page." The article's history runs to Classical antiquity and patronage, tribute offered in hope of support well into the eighteenth century, and the form can bite: Byron's dedication to Don Juan "savagely pilloried Southey," and Toni Morrison dedicated Beloved to "Sixty Million and more."

For the author it is the book's most personal page of front matter: one or two lines on a recto leaf, placed in KDP's order after the copyright page, typeset by hand when the interior is built in how to create a print-ready PDF.