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Citation Guide (MLA 9th Edition)

How to cite sources according to MLA
This page has been updated to MLA 9

General Template


General Template

Author's Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Supplemental Elements. Title of 1st Container, Contributor, Version or edition, Number, Publisher Name, Publication Date, Pages. Title of 2nd Container, Contributor, Version or edition, Number, Publisher Name, Publication Date, Pages. Supplemental Elements.

The layout and necessary elements vary depending on the source. See "How Do I Cite..." for more specific formatting. You do not need to use all of these elements for every source. Use those that are relevant to what you are citing.

Citation Template for Books

Commonly Used Elements

Author's Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Contributors, edition, shortened Publisher Name, Year of publication. 

Additional information and elements may be added to clarify details, such as original publication data, type of contribution, and online location.

The order of elements can change due to many factors:

  • Print or ebook
  • Translators
  • Editors
  • Citing an entire work
  • Citing a selection from a larger work (such as a collection of essays)
NOTE: The font colors and bold text on this page is used only to illustrate the different elements of the citation. DO NOT INCLUDE THESE STYLES in your Works Cited page.

Print Books

What to Include

Print books are the basic format for ciations. Add contributors and other publication data as needed.

Author's Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Contributors, Edition, Publisher Name, Year of publication.

Examples

Berlatsky, Noah. Wonder Woman: Bondage and Feminism in the Marston/Peter Comics, 1941-1948. Rutgers UP, 2017.

Brinkley, Alan. The Unfinished Nation: A Concise History of the American People. 7th ed, McGraw Hill, 2014.

Damrosch, David, et al., editors. The Longman Anthology of World Literature, 2nd ed., vol. A, Pearson Education, 2009.

Danticat, Edwidge. Brother, I'm Dying. Knopf, 2007.

DiYanni, Robert, editor. Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. 6th ed., McGraw Hill, 2007.

Foucault, Michel. The Archaeology of Knowledge. Translated by A. M. Sheridan Smith, 1st American ed., Pantheon Books, 1972.

Holbein, Hans, et al. The Dance of Death. 1538. Dover Publications, 1971. Facsimile.

Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis. Translated by Stanley Corngold, 2013 ed., Modern Library, 1915.

McKee, Timothy, and James A. McKee. Business Ethics: The Political Basis of Commerce. Oxford UP, 2009.​

Sewell, Anna. Black Beauty. Unabridged version, F. M. Lupton, 1877.

Strunk, William, Jr., and EB White. The Elements of Style. Illustrated by Maira Kalman, Penguin Press, 2005.

Sturken, Marita, and Lisa Cartwright. Practices of Looking: An Introduction to Visual Culture. 3rd edition, Oxford UP, 2018.

Wykes, Maggie, and Barrie Gunter. The Media and Body Image: If Looks Could Kill. Sage, 2005.

Zeigler-Hill, Virgil, and David K. Marcus, editors. The Dark Side of Personality: Science and Practice in Social, Personality, and Clinical Psychology. American Psychological Association, 2016.

E-Books

E-Books from a Library Database

What to Include

Include the same information as the print copy. Then add the name of the web site or platform and the ebook's URL.

Author's Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Edition, Publisher Name, Year of publication. Name of Library Database, DOI or URL. Accessed Date.

Examples

Abbott, Stacey. Celluloid Vampires: Life After Death in the Modern World. University of Texas Press, 2007. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.7560/716957. Accessed 20 Oct. 2023.

Bellantoni, Patti. If It's Purple, Someone's Gonna Die: The Power of Color in Visual Storytelling. Taylor and Francis, 2005. ProQuest Ebook Central, ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/otis-ebooks/detail.action?docID=234952.

Hashim, Ahmed S. "The Potential for Nuclear Proliferation Creates Tension." The Middle East, edited by Mary E. Williams, Greenhaven Press, 2000. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, link.gale.com/apps/doc/EJ3010229212/OVIC?u=los12365&sid=bookmark-OVIC&xid=4991e18d. Accessed 6 Jan. 2023. Originally published as "Nuclear Fears and Phantoms," Middle East Insight, 1998.

Norris, Robin, et al., editors. Feminist Approaches to Early Medieval English Studies. Amsterdam University Press, 2023. EBSCOhost, search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,sso&db=nlebk&AN=3464493&site=eds-live&scope=site.

Peabody, Rebecca, et al., editors. Visualizing Empire: Africa, Europe, and the Politics of Representation. Getty Publications, 2021. Project MUSE muse.jhu.edu/book/82028.

Vogt, W. Paul, et al. When to Use What Research Design. Guilford Publications, 2017. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/otis-ebooks/detail.action?docID=873354.

Sometimes a library database may post selected chapters or selections from e-book.

Hashim, Ahmed S. "The Potential for Nuclear Proliferation Creates Tension." The Middle East, edited by Mary E. Williams, Greenhaven Press, 2000. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, link.gale.com/apps/doc/EJ3010229212/OVIC?u=los12365&sid=bookmark-OVIC&xid=4991e18d. Accessed 6 Jan. 2023. Originally published as "Nuclear Fears and Phantoms," Middle East Insight, 1998.

E-Books on the Web

What to Include

Include the same information as the print copy. Then add the name of the database or platform and the ebook's URL.

Author's Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Edition, Publisher Name, Year of publication. Website Name, DOI or URL. Accessed Date.

Examples

Henty, George Alfred. The Cat of Bubastes: A Tale of Ancient Egypt. Illustrated by J.R. Weguelin. Blackie and Son, 1889. HathiTrust Digital Library, babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=mdp.39015073478847. Accessed 7 Nov. 2017.

Kavanagh, Jennifer and Michael D. Rich, Truth Decay: An Initial Exploration of the Diminishing Role of Facts and Analysis in American Public Life. RAND Corporation, 2018. https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR2314.html. Accessed 20 Oct. 2023.

  • Since RAND Corportation is both the publisher and the website name, I did not repeat the information in the citation

Downloaded E-Books

What to Include

Include the same information as the print copy. Include the e-book version or file format in the Edition statement.

Author's Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Edition, E-book ed. OR File Format OR App Name, Publisher Name, Year of publication.

Examples

MLA Handbook. 9th ed., e-book, Modern Language Association of America, 2021.

MLA Handbook. 9th ed., EPUB file, Modern Language Association of America, 2021.

MLA Handbook. 9th ed., Kindle ed., Modern Language Association of America, 2021.

Stevenson, Robert Louis. Treasure Island. 1883. Illustrated by Milo Winter, iBook ed., Children's Classics, 1986.

Anthologies and Collections

Use this when you are citing an entire work. See below for citing selections from these types of works.

What to Include

Author's Last Name, First Name, editor. Title of Book: Subtitle. Edition, Publisher Name, Year of publication.

If there is no editor given you may leave out that part of the citation.

Examples

Harrison, Charles, and Paul Wood, editors. Art in Theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas. 2nd ed., Blackwell Publishing, 2014.

DiYanni, Robert, editor. Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama. 6th ed., McGraw Hill, 2007.

Zeigler-Hill, Virgil, and David K. Marcus, editors. The Dark Side of Personality: Science and Practice in Social, Personality, and Clinical Psychology. American Psychological Association, 2016.

Short Story, Essay, or Article From an Anthology or Collection

Selection from a Larger Work

Mostly applies to chapters, essays, and articles in collections or anthologies. These larger works usually have editors; that is, they were written by multiple people.

This can also apply to a collection of works by a single author, when there are different people involved in each selection, such as editors, illustrators, and translators.

What to Include

Start with the author(s) of the selection--such as chapter, essay, poem, short story, article--followed by the title of the selection in quotes. Then add in the information for the larger work. At the end, include the page numbers of the selection.

If a generic part of a book--e.g. introduction, preface, foreward, afterward, and acknowledgments--has a unique title that does not identify it as such, you may add that generic label as a Supplemental Element. Include this label only when you want to highlight or emphasize its role in the book.

Author's Last Name, First Name. "Title of Short Story, Essay, or Article." Title of Book: Subtitle, edited by Editor's First Name and Last Name, Edition, Publisher Name, Year of publication, pp. ##-##.

Examples

Foucault, Michel. "The Functions of Literature." Translated by Alan Sheridan. Politics, Philosophy, Culture : Interviews and Other Writings, 1977-1984. Routledge, 1988, pp. 307-313.

Hashim, Ahmed S. "The Potential for Nuclear Proliferation Creates Tension." The Middle East, edited by Mary E. Williams, Greenhaven Press, 2000. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, link.gale.com/apps/doc/EJ3010229212/OVIC?u=los12365&sid=bookmark-OVIC&xid=4991e18d. Accessed 6 Jan. 2023. Originally published as "Nuclear Fears and Phantoms," Middle East Insight, 1998.

Howard, Rebecca Moore. “Avoiding Sentence Fragments.” Writing Matters: A Handbook for Writing and Research, 2nd ed., McGraw Hill, 2014, pp. 600-10.

Kritzman, Lawrence D. "Foucault and the Politics of Experience." Introduction. Politics, Philosophy, Culture: Interviews and Other Writings, 1977-1984. Routledge, 1988, pp. ix-xxv.

Mulvey, Laura. From "Visual Pleasure and Narrative Cinema." Art in Theory 1900-2000: An Anthology of Changing Ideas, edited by Charles Harrison and Paul Wood, 2nd ed., Blackwell Publishing, 2014, pp. 982-989. 

Hashim, Ahmed S. "The Potential for Nuclear Proliferation Creates Tension." The Middle East, edited by Mary E. Williams, Greenhaven Press, 2000. Gale In Context: Opposing Viewpoints, link.gale.com/apps/doc/EJ3010229212/OVIC?u=los12365&sid=bookmark-OVIC&xid=4991e18d. Accessed 6 Jan. 2023. Originally published as "Nuclear Fears and Phantoms," Middle East Insight, 1998.

Poe, Edgar Allan. "The Black Cat". Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, and Drama, edited by Robert DiYanni, 6th ed., McGraw Hill, 2007, pp. 137-43.

Tynan, Kenneth. "The Kansas Farm Murders." The Critical Response to Truman Capote, edited by Joseph J. Waldmeir and John C. Waldmeir, Greenwood Press, 1999, pp. 129-34.​

Book With an Unknown, Group or Corporate Author

Unknown or Anonymous

What to Include

Skip the author and use the title. Don't include initial articles like "A", "An" or "The".

Exception: If the aurhot on the title page is listed as "Anonymous", then you may list is as the author.

Title of Book: Subtitle. Edition, Publisher Name, Year of Publication.

Examples

Beowulf. Lerner Publishing Group, 2019. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/otis-ebooks/detail.action?docID=5441766.

Anonymous [Joe Klein]. Primary Colors: a novel of politics. Random House, 1996.

Group or Corporate Authors

Group or Corporate Author is the same as the publisher

Instead of repeating the same information, start with the title and treat the author as the Publisher. .

Title of Book: Subtitle. Edition, Group or Corporate Author Name, Year of Publication.

Examples

Bait and Switch Selling. Competition Bureau of Canada, 2014. Pamphlet.

MLA Handbook. 8th ed., e-book, Modern Language Association of America, 2016.

Group or Corporate Author is not the publisher

Use the group name as the Author.

Group or Corporate Author. Title of Book: Subtitle. Edition, Publisher Name, Year of Publication.

Examples

Calgary Educational Partnership Foundation. Employability Skills: Creating My Future, Nelson, 1996.

How to Add Translators

Translated the Entire Work

What to Include

If the translator is responsible for the entire book (or container), treat them as a Contributor.

Author's Last Name, First Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Translated by Name, Edition, Publisher Name, Year of publication.

Examples

Foucault, Michel. The Archaeology of Knowledge. Translated by A. M. Sheridan Smith, 1st American ed., Pantheon Books, 1972.

Kafka, Franz. The Metamorphosis. Translated by Stanley Corngold, 2013 ed., Modern Library, 1915.

Translated a Portion of a Work

What to Include

If the translator is only responsible for translating a portion of a book--such as a chapter, essay, or poem--treat them as Additional Elements. Also include the page range after the year of publication.

Author's Last Name, First Name. "Selection Title." Translated by Name. Title of Book: Subtitle. Editors, Edition, Publisher Name, Year of publication, pp. ##-##.

Examples

Foucault, Michel. "The Functions of Literature." Translated by Alan Sheridan. Politics, Philosophy, Culture: Interviews and Other Writings, 1977-1984. Routledge, 1988, pp. 307-313.

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