According to the recording apparatus of the present invention, recording papers are wound by the winding member while the end portions of the recording papers are tightly held. The recording papers can therefore be correctly reciprocated. Furthermore, before recording is effected by the recording head, the recording papers are one wound back by the winding member to an initial position, thereby removing strains or deflections of the recording papers. Also, in the case of a color printer of thermal transcription, images in each of the four colors can be accurately overlapped without disagreement.