Preface/Front Matter

Abstract

In 1970, when the first typescript of The Molecular Biology of Tumour Viruses was completed, an attempt to produce a comprehensive and reasonably detailed account of the DNA and RNA tumor viruses and their interactions with their cellular hosts, which could be published in a single book of manageable proportions, was feasible. By early 1973, when the final draft was ready for the printer, its length had increased considerably but not immoderately. The book proved to be timely and useful and in 1975 we began to think seriously about the possibility of producing a revised edition. It quickly became apparent that if a revised edition were to be produced, it could not be published between two covers; and an early decision was taken to separate the book into three volumes: one dealing with transformed animal cells in culture, one with the DNA viruses, and one with the RNA viruses. Perhaps in one sense this was an admission of defeat; none of us felt able to survey the whole field of tumor virology with the authority and critical perception necessary to produce a single comprehensive book to satisfy those who had used its predecessor. The apparent alternatives were a more general text and a more detailed treatise, but in reality, only the latter was feasible.

The inevitable decision to publish three specialized parts, each about the length of the original book but with, we anticipate, a lower circulation, has had one economic consequence as regrettable as it was inescapable. The price