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On Wikipedia and other encyclopedias, the titles of certain types of works (movies, video games, books) are often in italic type. Is there a reason for this?

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  • I remember being told when I was at school - 'A hamlet is a small village. Hamlet is the name of a man. "Hamlet" (or Hamlet) is the name of a play.'
    – Kate Bunting
    Commented Aug 30 at 14:35

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It's simply a convention. Titles of books and movies are put in italics. Titles of short stories and magazine articles are put in quotes.

It just helps the reader to recognize that this is a title and not a description. Suppose this convention did not exist. I write, "I read the story of George Washington." Does this mean that I read a book whose title was, The Story of George Washington? Or do I mean that I read a book with some other title that was about George Washington?

So it's very helpful to have some convention to distinguish titles from descriptions. And it's helpful if we can all agree on what that convention is. If one person uses italics and another uses bold and another writes titles in red, etc, it would not be clear what was intended. So this is the convention that the English-speaking world has settled on.

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The convention is the following:

  1. Italicize titles of "freestanding" publications (books, movies, perodicals, plays, vinyl records or CDs, paintings, photographs, etc.).

  2. Put titles of works that are published in collections and that are not commonly published on their own (articles, chapters, poems, songs, etc.) in quotation marks.

The convention has the following purpose:

  • To identify titles of works and distinguish them from the surrounding text.
  • To distinguish freestanding publications (such as a book) from non-freestanding publications (such as a chapter in a book).
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It's to make it clear where the title ends. The reader might not be familiar with the work in question, and the typographical distinction aims to prevent confusion whether a given word is still part of the title, or continuing the sentence. A little redundant in English, but it can also be used in languages that don't Capitalise Every Word of the Title like English does. Sometimes titles may be put in quotation marks instead for the same effect.

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    Italicizing a title is not redundant in English. There are styles, such as APA, that do not use title case for citations. And your statement that English "Capitalise[s] Every Word of the Title" is wrong even in itself, because you did not capitalise "of" and "the". Following your rule that every word in a title is capitalised, does that mean that Capitalise Every Word is one title of one work and Title is another? I hope you can see how your statement is nonsense.
    – Ben
    Commented Aug 24 at 17:18
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    @Ben Yes, I see how omitting a nitpicky detail makes an answer complete nonsense - at least whenever it's me who wrote it.
    – Divizna
    Commented Aug 24 at 17:36
  • I didn't write that your answer is complete nonsense. I wrote that your statement – that English capitalises every word of a title – is nonsense.
    – Ben
    Commented Aug 24 at 21:22
  • IMHO, English should capitalise every word of the title.  The current rules are arcane, not widely understood, and seem to serve no good purpose; capitalising every word is much simpler, easier, and removes ambiguity.  I don't understand why everyone doesn't do that…
    – gidds
    Commented Aug 25 at 11:16
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I believe it is similar to putting it in quotes, to make it a noun phrase. Many titles (at least in modern work) of books and movies are effectively sentences, now; "Star Wars Episode VIII - The Last Jedi". Or "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone".

Using italics for the title sets it off as a noun phrase, so it doesn't confuse the reader, when a reference is being made to the movie by its full title.

In Star Wars, for example, all the movies begin with Star Wars, so it isn't enough to just reference Star Wars, you need to use the full title. Same goes for "Harry Potter".

I have never read of this italicization as a formal rule anywhere, I think it is just a convention started when authors/marketers begin using whole sentences as titles. Another example: Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe (Shortened to Fried Green Tomatoes for the movie.)

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  • Hey! This is actually an incorrect answer because italics follow certain grammar rules. Consider adding those rules to this answer and revising it from there.
    – AnnWithNoE
    Commented Aug 24 at 19:21
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Yes, there is a reason for this. When you see titles like movies, books, or video games written in italics, it's a way to highlight that these are important words.

Italics help the readers to easily spot the names of these works in a text. It's like giving special attention to these words.

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    – Community Bot
    Commented Aug 24 at 15:34
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    The italics don't highlight that these are important works. That would imply that titles of non-important works aren't italicized. Which isn't the case.
    – Ben
    Commented Aug 24 at 21:26

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