SECOND INSTALMENT

New Zealand Listener, Volume 21, Issue 540, 28 October 1949, Page 15

SECOND INSTALMENT

THE OXFORD JUNIOR ENCYCLOPAEDIA, Vol. HI (Mankind), General editors, Laura E. Salt and Geoffrey Boumphrey; the Oxford University Press, Geoffrey Cumberlege, London. English price, 30/- net. T is difficult, after noticing the first volume of the Oxford Junior Encyclopaedia, to find new words in which to express ‘the same feelings of satisfaction at this continuing evidence of the ability of editors and contributors. But, if anything, appreciation grows with acquaintance; and that combination of lucidity, simplicity of style and _liveliness of manner which was the most vivid impression of the first volume is even more to be welcomed when applied to such subjects as Mass, Matter, Time, and Space, where familiar concepts have been bent, compressed or otherwise pushed out of their traditional shape by the impact of higher mathematics and atomic physics. Volume III, (the second is still in preparation) is subtitled "The Universe" and covers in some 500 pages the physical background of life, from the commonplace facts of geographical environment to the complexities of the spacetime continuum. The original decision of the editors, not to "write down to children" has not been lost sight of, but nowhere do they presume specialised knowledge on the part of the reader (as so many encyclopaedists are prone to do). Where the subject is abstruse, the entry deals with it more or less ab initio and many of the longer entries (such as those on Relativity and

the Atom) are models of clear and concise exposition. A good deal of art has, in fact, been pressed into the service of science, and there is even an occasional leavening of humour-under the heading Time, the entry begins "It is easier to measure time than to understand it"; a Shakespearean quotation adds wit and point to a description of the industries of Copenhagen, and Chicago is summed up in a sentence by Carl Sandburg. Here and there the proof reader or researcher seems to have nodded momentarily. The range of the Palomar reflector is given as 100,000,000 light years — substantially lower than the figure claimed for the big telescope by its Californian owners; New -Zealand locomotives are still described as American type "with bells," and Weston Martyr’s mame~has been misspelt in an incidental reference to him on page 222, Such slips, however, serve to indicate the book’s vast compass. Once again the work of Helen Mary Petter, the illustrations editor, requires special mention. The book is prodigally illustrated and reproduction is of an unvaryingly high standard. The inclusion of five excellent watercolours (one of them "Hut Point and Mount Erebus," by Dr. E. A. Wilson) in the total of eight colour-plates

is especially pleasing.

J.

M.