A. I. TUDOROVSKY, Electricity and Magnetism, Part 1 (Electrostatics and Electric Current), GTTI, 1933, 360 pp.

No branch of physics has such a varied selection of textbooks for higher education as electricity, and it would seem that in this field it should be easiest of all to arrive at a steady state, i.e., at a standard satisfying all the requirements of higher education. In reality this is not so, which is evident if only from the fact that no two textbooks on electricity resemble one another.

The chief reason for this lies, of course, in the rapid growth of the science, which requires not only additions and corrections, but also a radical change in the nature of the exposition and in the entire scheme. But alongside this, one very often also encounters the neglect of elementary requirements that should be imposed on a textbook. These are the requirements of sufficient completeness, modernity, simultaneous simplicity of exposition and rigor, adaptation to the levels of the student’s knowledge and to methods of teaching. Sometimes an author is too carried away by individual questions, forgetting the whole; sometimes the striving for simplicity entails errors that confuse the student; in the pursuit of practical applications, unclarified theoretical foundations remain, etc. It is difficult to name a textbook on electricity in which, despite sometimes high merits, there would not be at least one such failing.

A. I. Tudorovsky’s book, unlike many textbooks on electricity, has no such elementary but organic shortcomings. The book is written very carefully, thoughtfully, and with great pedagogical tact. The author is not tempted by the many attempts of recent times to begin the exposition at once with the theory of electrons or with electrolysis, preferring (rightly, in our opinion) to begin with classical electrostatics. It is presented in the measure necessary and sufficient for a physics student taking the general course. The exposition is, insofar as we could observe, detailed enough to remain entirely comprehensible while preserving rigor (even mathematical rigor). The inclusion of such problems as calculation of the field of a dipole, examples on Gauss’s theorem, and calculation of a cylindrical capacitor is very timely.

Electrostatics is followed by an extensive chapter, “Electrical Properties of Matter,” containing a concise but very clear introduction to electronics. The attentive treatment of material that might be regarded as already fully established may be judged from at least the following example. Describing Crookes’s experiment with the cross, the author, after repeating the usual argument in favor of the analogy between cathode and light rays, notes: “However, the mere fact that the shadow of the cross is quite sharply outlined, despite the fact that the source of radiation is a disk of almost the same dimensions as the cross, points to a difference in the character of the two processes.” We encounter this necessary observation in a textbook for the first time. In this chapter the author gives a detailed exposition of the theoretical ideas concerning the contact potential difference and piezoelectricity.

In the next section of the book, “Electric Current,” the range of facts connected with Ohm’s law is skillfully and, to a considerable degree, newly presented.

Let us point, for example, to the treatment of the general law not only for linear conductors. Practical methods of measuring resistance are presented in the book with the required completeness. Chapter eleven gathers the basic physical information on metallic conductivity and gives a detailed outline of the theory, including Sommerfeld’s theory. The last two chapters of the book are devoted to electrolytes and to electric current in gases. Both chapters, written on the basis of classical concepts and interpretations, nevertheless differ favorably from the usual expositions by their strict and new selection of material and by their clarity.

Among the shortcomings of the book that we have noticed, let us indicate: an unclear exposition of the Kerr phenomenon (which is arranged, as we think, out of place and not illuminated theoretically, although this presents no difficulty); the absence of modern ideas about electrolytes (the Debye–Hückel theory); the transfer of Millikan’s experiments into electronics, although in essence this is pure electrostatics; and a not very distinct exposition of the ideas of Faraday–Maxwell, which, of course, will always be especially interesting for the student.

The author was not afraid (and rightly so) to introduce into the book the concept of Fermi statistics, but in connection with this, and apart from it, it would not have hurt to devote a few pages to the facts and ideas of quantum mechanics, especially the diffraction of electron waves. Otherwise quanta and nonclassical statistics burst in as a deus ex machina, breaking the logic and coherence of the exposition.

Of the small remarks, we note that the author follows the opinion of many in repeating that the conclusion about the atomicity of electricity from Faraday’s laws was first made by Helmholtz in 1880. In reality such a conclusion is already contained with complete clarity in Maxwell’s Treatise.

The shortcomings we have mentioned are, of course, partly debatable, and are wholly eliminated by their very small influence on the great merits of A. I. Tudorovsky’s book. From this book one can learn well, and it is pleasant to teach from it.

S. I. Vavilov