How do I set the author of a document?

is there an equivalent to \title{author}. could not figure out how to set title for a document

You can add metadata (title, authors, description, keywords, date) to the PDF using set document(/*...*/) rules: Document Function – Typst Documentation

If you want to show these visually there is no built-in, but most templates will have a way to specify them, usually in their main show rule. Many templates will also set the above metadata for you.

Example

For example, the ilm template is instantiated with

#show: ilm.with(
  title: [Your Title],
  author: "Max Mustermann",
  // ...
)

and the above will set the document metadata title and author for you, as well as display them graphically.

If you’re not using a template, just put title and author into some #text[] with increased size and some vertical spacing (#v(..)) around it. (& metadata as above)