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MLA Book Citation: Format, Examples & Rules (9th Edition)

MLA Book Citation: Format, Examples & Rules (9th Edition)
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    MLA Book Citation in MLA 9th edition follows one core pattern: Author Last, First. Title of the Book. Publisher, Year. The title is italicized, the publisher and year close the entry, and each in-text citation adds the page number.

    Every rule and example below follows the MLA Handbook, 9th edition (2021), the current standard used across the humanities.

    What is the basic MLA format for a book?

    A basic MLA book citation lists the author inverted, the italicized title, the publisher, and the year, each separated by periods: Author Last, First. Title. Publisher, Year. MLA 9 no longer requires the city of publication or the medium (Print).

    Capitalize the title in title case and give the publisher’s name in full, dropping only business words like “Inc.” or “Company” when they are not essential. End the entry with the copyright year shown on the book’s title or copyright page.

    One authorMorrison, Toni. Beloved. Alfred A. Knopf, 1987.

    One authorKingsolver, Barbara. The Poisonwood Bible. Harper Perennial, 2005.

    What are the parts of an MLA book citation?

    Every MLA book entry is built from MLA’s nine core elements, though a simple book uses only a few: author, title of source, publisher, and publication date. When you cite a digital copy, you add a container and a location (URL) at the end.

    MLA book citation (e-book edition), colour-coded by element
    Morrison, Toni. Beloved. Alfred A. Knopf, 1987. Google Books, books.google.com/books?id=beloved.
    • Author — last name first, then a period.
    • Title of book — italicized, title case.
    • Publisher — full name, followed by a comma.
    • Year — the copyright/publication year.
    • Location — container and URL, only for online or database copies.

    How do I cite a book with two or more authors?

    For two authors, invert only the first name and join them with “and”: Last, First, and First Last. For three or more authors, name only the first author followed by et al. The order matches the book’s title page, not alphabetical order.

    Authors How to list them
    One Morrison, Toni.
    Two Gillespie, Paula, and Neal Lerner.
    Three or more Wysocki, Anne Frances, et al.

    Two authorsGillespie, Paula, and Neal Lerner. The Allyn and Bacon Guide to Peer Tutoring. Allyn and Bacon, 2000.

    Three+ authorsWysocki, Anne Frances, et al. Writing New Media: Theory and Applications for Expanding the Teaching of Composition. Utah State UP, 2004.

    How do I cite a chapter, edition, or translation?

    To cite one chapter or essay in an edited book, treat the book as a container: put the chapter title in quotation marks, italicize the book, name the editor with “edited by,” and end with the page range. Add an edition number or translator in the same slots when relevant.

    Chapter in edited bookCopeland, Edward. “Money.” The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen, edited by Edward Copeland and Juliet McMaster, Cambridge UP, 1997, pp. 131-48.

    Specific editionGibaldi, Joseph. MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 6th ed., Modern Language Association, 2003.

    Translated bookGarcía Márquez, Gabriel. One Hundred Years of Solitude. Translated by Gregory Rabassa, Harper & Row, 1970.

    How do I cite an e-book or a book from a database?

    For an e-book read on a platform, add the platform as a container and the URL as the location; drop the URL if you used a downloadable app edition. If a specific e-book edition is stated, note it after the title, such as “Kindle ed.”

    Library databaseDoctorow, Cory. Little Brother. Tor Teen, 2008. ProQuest Ebook Central, ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/little-brother.

    Named e-book editionSedaris, David. Calypso. Kindle ed., Little, Brown and Company, 2018.

    How does the in-text citation for a book work?

    An MLA in-text citation pairs the author’s last name with the page number, with no comma between them: (Morrison 47). If you name the author in your sentence, cite only the page: (47). For a work with three or more authors, use the first author plus et al.

    Situation In-text example
    One author (Morrison 47)
    Author named in sentence Morrison writes … (47).
    Two authors (Gillespie and Lerner 12)
    Three or more (Wysocki et al. 88)

    How accurate is this guide, and what are its limits?

    These rules reflect the MLA Handbook, 9th edition, so they are current as of 2021. MLA is deliberately a flexible framework: the nine core elements let you describe sources the handbook never lists by name, so two careful researchers may format an unusual source slightly differently.

    Always confirm the author, title, publisher, and year against the book’s own title and copyright pages rather than a retailer listing, which often shows a reprint year. When your instructor’s style sheet conflicts with these defaults, follow the instructor. A generator speeds up formatting, but you remain responsible for a final proofread.

    Frequently asked questions

    Common questions about citing books in MLA 9th edition are answered below.