Hi, a question I stumbled over several times without having an satisfying answer: Which weight is darker, Roman or Book?
I always was sure, that book is the darker weight, because too much white at long text is making the eyes tired and so a darkish text is a better choice. But over and over again I see book weights, that are lighter than the roman weight. I wonder if even type designers seem to be confusing this in present times?

I'm very curious what you think! What is correct or more common?

Cheers!
Methom

I'm definitely not an expert on this topic but I found a few links if you're interested:

https://www.fonts.com/content/learning/fontology/level-1/type-anatomy/weight-and-proportion

https://typedrawers.com/discussion/3349/book-regular-medium

It seems like there's no consensus and it seems to be up to the author to choose which "name" to associate with the font's weight. Of course some weights are more obvious than others but for the Medium/Book/Regular/Text category it really seems like there are no clear rules. It seems to depend on the use of your font whether it may be suitable for larger portions of text for example. Also it seems like "Roman" can be used for "straight" weights as opposed to "Italic" but then again I'm not an expert on these aspects at all.

Thanks for the links frd. Really seems to be not definitive.

Reading across these extensive threads, I come to the following conclusion: Book is a weight for extensive reading and refers to smaller sizes. Therefore it also refers to optical weights that are optimised for better reading in small sizes, which results in a lowering of contrast by thickening the thinnest strokes in a letter. If Regular is the standard weight (also named as Roman in the past), wich is good for casual setting in 10-12 pt, Book should be a bit darker analogue to optical weights, because long text in publications like books tend to be set in a smaller sizes like 8 pt. Even if the font is a grotesque and has less stroke contrast, I would consider Book as a darker weight, because as I mentioned before, too much white at long text is making the eyes tired. This is something I experienced by myself. The smaller type is set, the thinner the strokes get. In result the white of the page is eating up the glyphs and this is tiring the readers eyes.

Of course, this is my view, but to me it makes more sense to place a Book weight between Regular and Medium. What definitely makes no sense to me, is to place a Book weight between Regular and Light.