Reviews. A New Summary of Knowledge

Abstract

THE publishers of this new composite book by twenty-two able and well-informed writers are fully justified for part of the large claim they make for it as the “cheapest book of our generation” and the “most remarkable event in publishing history”. It contains, in just over a thousand pages, twenty-four essays on different branches of knowledge by acknowledged experts, and it offers the whole in a volume little larger than a new novel and at only a shilling more. Its production is welcome evidence, like so many similar popular series, that there is an increasing appetite abroad for something more than mere amusement or sensation, and we believe that the statistics of public libraries are beginning to tell the same tale. It is evident also that no reviewer, however conscientious, could hope to give an adequate account, much less a judgment, on so varied a menu served up by chefs each of them far more accomplished in his own branch than himself. The most that can be done is to give a general idea, noting outstanding excellences, and then to qualify—as is also necessary—the impression that might be created by the publishers' notice.

An Outline of Modern Knowledge.

Dr. William Rose. Pp. xv + 1103. (London: Victor Gollancz, Ltd., 1931.) 8s. 6d. net.