The main typeface is ITC Giovanni book, designed by Robert Slimbach and released by the International Typeface Corporation in 1989. Based on the classic old-style humanist faces, especially that of Nicolas Jenson who was one of the first to break away from Gutenberg’s “black face.” Characterized by Jenson’s diagonal bar to the lower case “e” but is a rounder, more refined letter than his, with proportionally larger x height, and more balanced weight of stroke for present-day lithographic and digital printing.
Headings and captions are set in Bembo, a twentieth-century reworking of the classic humanist face cut by Francesco Griffo and first printed by the Venetian, Aldus Manutius, in 1496. Classic proportions and good legibility have made this the mainstay of book printing and the benchmark for classic typeface design for five hundred years. Reworked by the Monotype Corporation for Monotype hot-metal printing in the early twentieth century and then again for lithographic and digital printing for the present.
If you enjoyed Paper: An Elegy, why not visit
the Paper Museum?
www.thepapermuseum.com