Les vitamines

Abstract

TWO distinguished French workers in the field of vitamin chemistry and physiology have attempted in this little book a task the difficulty of which can probably be appreciated to the full only by those who have attempted the same or a similar one. To take a living and growing subject, especially in the biological sciences, and attempt to expound it to the non-technical reader, is to run one of two risks. Either everything may be made artificially simple by the use of too facile generalisation, by the suppression of inconsistencies and difficulties, by presenting as accepted facts what are actually only the author's interpretations of facts; or the saving clause and the citation of unexplained exceptions, the clumsy attempt to describe in words of one syllable what can only be defined neatly in words of many, the patronising parenthesis and the irritating footnote—all these may combine to scatter and confuse the reader. In the former case, technical colleagues look askance, and rightly: in the latter, non-technical readers turn away, and naturally.

Les vitamines.

Par Mme. Lucie Randoin et Henri Simonnet. (Collection Armand Colin: Section de biologie, No. 145.) Pp. iv + 220. (Paris: Armand Colin, 1932.) 10.50 francs.