senior clinical students, as it does not provide an account ofgeneral pathology. The spirit of the new core curriculum isevident but I am surprised to hear that the authors wereallowed to teach pathology, as it seems that teaching and-ologies are banned and we should now be facilitating studentenquiry into abnormal structure!

D. T. MMRoyal Group of Hospitals Trust andThe Queen’s University of Belfast

Contemporary Issues in Surgical Pathology. Pathology ofLymph Nodes.L M. W (Ed.). Churchill Livingstone, Edinburgh,1996. No. of pages: 453. Price: £75.00.

In the preface to this volume of Contemporary Issues inSurgical Pathology, Lawrence Weiss makes it clear that this isnot intended as a comprehensive text on haematopathology.Instead, the book aims at providing an in-depth coverage of alimited number of important topics. In practice, the 17 authorscover a wide range of topics in 11 chapters. There is an openingchapter, giving an up-to-date account of molecular haemat-opathology with details of the techniques used, followed byfindings in all the major categories of lymphoma. There followexcellent and authoritative chapters on reactive lymphaden-opathies and separate chapters on classical Hodgkin’s diseaseand nodular lymphocyte predominant Hodgkin’s disease.While the importance of classic Reed–Sternberg cells in defin-ing and classifying Hodgkin’s disease is not disputed in the erabefore immunohistochemistry came into widespread use, it isrefreshing to read the statement by the authors of the chapteron classical Hodgkin’s disease: ‘We believe that a diagnosis ofHodgkin’s disease may be rendered on the basis of Reed–Sternberg variants, even in the absence of classical RS cells. . .’. A few years ago, that statement would have earned theauthors a fatwa.There is a brief chapter on the classification of non-

Hodgkin’s lymphoma that includes discussion of the REALclassification. The need for this is apparent, with a number ofthe chapters suffering from the obfuscation of Working For-mulation terminology. The remaining chapters include anexcellent account of low-grade B-cell lymphomas and a chap-ter on diffuse, aggressive non-Hodgkin’s lymphomas. Thechapter on peripheral cell lymphomas contains a large amountof data but does little to clarify this complex group oflymphomas. There is a valuable chapter on post-transplantlymphoproliferation disorders, a chapter of Ki-1 positivelarge cell lymphomas (anaplastic large cell lymphoma), and afinal, interesting chapter on histiocytic and dendritic cellproliferations.The illustrations in this book are in black and white and

most are of a high standard. The chapters are well referenced,up to 1995, making this a valuable source book for the nextfew years. Haematopathologists will undoubtedly find thisvolume of interest. If, however, you are looking for a diagnos-tic text, buy the AFIP Fascicle.

D. H. WSchool of Medicine

Southampton University Hospitals Trust

Cells, Tissues and Diseases. Principles of General Pathology.G. M and I J. Blackwell Science, Oxford,1996. No. of pages: 974.

Somewhat irrationally, I am impressed by big books and thisone weighed in at a satisfactory 2·88 kg, measured

278#215#47 mm, and has 974 pages bearing 1074 illus-trations. I quite liked the cover—obviously a picture of anendothelium en face with adherent lipid droplets. So far, sogood and then I opened the book and found a detailedexplanation of the cover illustration—it is a pun on the title ofthe book. My heart sank. A pun which required a detailedexplanation seems barely worth the effort. My spirits wererestored, however, on reading the preface, which contained arobust defence of the science of general pathology. I gleefullynoted (for future use in my department) the statement—‘Asregards the bacteriologists and immunologists, their speciali-ties were taught as part of pathology only a few decades ago.When they branched off, they also sawed themselves off fromthe main trunk and dropped all connections with the study ofdisease.’The authors are not modest in the scope of the clientele

which they hope will be attracted to their book—‘all pathol-ogists, as well as physicians, all teachers of pathology, path-ology residents, inquisitive medical students, biologists,including college teachers, molecular biologists, immunolo-gists, bacteriologists, physiologists, researchers, graduatestudents and basic scientists’! There is nothing wrong withambition, but the reality is that not all these groups will rushout to buy this book.In the preface the authors pose a fundamental

question—‘Why another General Pathology textbook?’ Why,indeed, and I am not sure that the authors give an entirelyconvincing answer. Their ambition is to produce a booksuitable for medical and non-medical readers and which would(i) focus on the cell as the ‘elementary patient’, (ii) emphasizeprinciples, (iii) use the historical approach, (iv) use illustrationsintegral to the message, (v) emphasize that the manifestationsof disease can be found in all walks of life, (vi) tell a singlestory from beginning to end, and (vii) try to cope construc-tively with the literature explosion. There are, of course, anumber of distinguished textbooks currently available whichcould lay claim to any or most of these attributes. I like thehistorical approach, but it is not to everyone’s taste. I alsoenjoy illustrations which are integral to the message and thenew line drawings in the book are generally excellent. Thequality of some of the other illustrations, however, is quitevariable—it is very difficult, for example, to interpret Figure1.2 and the publishers need to pay attention to the black andwhite pictures throughout.The book has five main subdivisions—Cellular Pathology,

Injury and Inflammation, Vascular Disturbances, Immuno-pathology, and Tumours. All are well written and informativeand I would single out Injury and Inflammation and VascularDisturbances as being truly excellent. In terms of the potentialreadership, the book is likely to be of most benefit to thosewithout formal medical training who have a particular needand desire to obtain an intellectual framework in generalpathology.We are informed that the book is the product of conjugal

enterprise and, as such, is of ‘single authorship’. It seems thatthe enterprise was herculean in scope and consumed a largequantity of cellulose. One is reassured to be told that 101 treeshave been planted in compensation. The end result is a literarystyle which is certainly individualistic. I found it very readable–others may not. Books with a single or a limited number ofauthors are sometimes accused of lack of balance. Looking atthe section on pathological calcification (a topic often dealtwith in a superficial naive fashion), I found the treatment to bereassuringly quite sophisticated. Overall, the book evidences awelcome integrating approach. One of the most telling illus-trations is the first (Figure P-1). This shows the eight levels(genes]populations) at which diseases may be studied. Nowa-days we are so focused at genetic and molecular level that it

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? 1997 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. , . 183: 242–248 (1997)