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Geology of clays—Weathering, sedimentology, geochemistry
Sedimentary Geology- ElsevierPublishingCompany,Amsterdam- Printedin The Netherlands
Book Reviews Geology of Clays--Weathering, Sedimentology, Geochemistry. G. MILLOT.(Translation by W. R. FARRANDand H. PAQUET.) Springer, Berlin, 1970, 429 pp., 85 illus., 2 colour plates, 15 tables, DM 61.--; US. $.16,80. English-speaking readers have long been waiting for a translation of this book. Papers on clay geology and geochemistry are widely scattered throughout the scientific literature and the author's successful effort to assemble the material into a single book was appreciated by clay scientists throughout the world. The subjects covered range from a discussion of the classification and nomenclature of clay minerals to the geochemistry of ions in the hydrosphere, the place of clays in the geochemical cycle, the provenance of clays--inheritance, transformation or neoformation, laboratory syntheses, problems of silicification and crystal growth and detailed discussions of some important clay deposits. Professor Millot is well qualified to write about these subjects : in his laboratory and under his guidance much pioneering work has been carried out. The book contains over 900 literature references, but it always remains a very personal record of the author's own opinions and concepts, without ever becoming dogmatic. Clay scientists would be well advised to heed his repeated warnings against too rigid a clay nomenclature. Clay minerals change in response to their environment and a specific mineral name may merely refer to the end-member of a continuous series, thus obscuring the true nature of the clay under investigation. The English translation of the book is a verbatim rendering of the French and therefore disappointing. The informal style of the original version cannot be translated literally into English without losing clarity and readability. Moreover, the translation is at times so mechanical and ungrammatical that some expressions or even entire passages become almost unintelligible, e.g. "the differences jump before your eyes" (p. 189), "the forest does not have the capacity to store up thick ar6nes; on the contrary it favourizes (sic) total hydrolysis beneath its feet" (p. 161). It is also regrettable that the publication of the English edition was not made the occasion for up-dating the book. The original version, published in 1964, covers the literature up to the year 1962. In the course of the eight years which elapsed until the English translation was completed clay science has advanced rapidly. While it was probably impractical to revise the entire book, an additional chapter summarizing recent events would have been most welcome. Nevertheless,
232
BOOK REVIEWS
the book is indispensable to anyone concerned with the geology and geochemistry of clays and it is unfortunate that the translation does not do justice to the original. L. HELLER (Jerusalem)
Flysch Sedimentology in North America. J. LAJOIE (Editor). Business and Economic Service, Toronto, 1970 (Spec. Pap., No. 7. Geol. Assoc. Can.), 272 pp. The present publication is the result of a two-day symposium on flysch sedimentology, held in 1969 and sponsored by the Geological Association of Canada. In the introduction tbe editor states: " T h e primary objective of the symposium was to give N o r t h American sedimentologists an opportunity to compare results, present contrasting ideas, and assess problems related to flysch sedimentology. The symposium was not intended as a review of all work on flysch deposits in North America, or as a discussion on the definition of the term flysch". The book contains fourteen articles. Specialists, several of them with an outstanding reputation in the sedimentology of flysch and of turbidites, have written a book which has only one limitation, namely that it deals " o n l y " with North American examples. The present publication could only be considered to some extent as a textbook on flysch and turbidites; facts and ideas are brought forward by various authors in their contributions so that the organization of the book, if considered as a textbook, is not ideal. I only use the term " t e x t b o o k " to illusstrate the wealth of information and of ideas which make the reader realize the considerable progress made in our knowledge of these matters since the appearance of Bouma and Brouwer's Turbidites, No. 3 in the Developments in Sedimentolog)' Series (Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1964). The concept of fan deposition and the mechanisms of sand and gravel flow, and the lateral contact of their products with turbidite sequences show the progress made by the investigations of Dill, Dott, Stauffer and others. Hsii presents a clear review about the problems of terminology around the term "flysch". Nine papers then follow dealing with the filling of geosynclines which range in age from Early Paleozoic to Late Mesozoic; they are derived from areas spread over the whole North American continent. Most striking in the present volume is the impulse which the sedimemology of this kind of deposits has received from the hypotheses brought forward by our colleagues in megatectonics. Less than ten years ago the juxtaposition of finegrained and coarse-grained mass-movement deposits still remained in the descriptional phase. Now various authors have found an explanation with the help of the plate tectonics and sea-floor spreading concepts. Recent models are suggested of the depositional environments which exist along the tectonically relatively stable western North Atlantic as well as along the active eastern Pacific coasts. The distinction in different tectonic environments,
Book Reviews Geology of Clays--Weathering, Sedimentology, Geochemistry. G. MILLOT.(Translation by W. R. FARRANDand H. PAQUET.) Springer, Berlin, 1970, 429 pp., 85 illus., 2 colour plates, 15 tables, DM 61.--; US. $.16,80. English-speaking readers have long been waiting for a translation of this book. Papers on clay geology and geochemistry are widely scattered throughout the scientific literature and the author's successful effort to assemble the material into a single book was appreciated by clay scientists throughout the world. The subjects covered range from a discussion of the classification and nomenclature of clay minerals to the geochemistry of ions in the hydrosphere, the place of clays in the geochemical cycle, the provenance of clays--inheritance, transformation or neoformation, laboratory syntheses, problems of silicification and crystal growth and detailed discussions of some important clay deposits. Professor Millot is well qualified to write about these subjects : in his laboratory and under his guidance much pioneering work has been carried out. The book contains over 900 literature references, but it always remains a very personal record of the author's own opinions and concepts, without ever becoming dogmatic. Clay scientists would be well advised to heed his repeated warnings against too rigid a clay nomenclature. Clay minerals change in response to their environment and a specific mineral name may merely refer to the end-member of a continuous series, thus obscuring the true nature of the clay under investigation. The English translation of the book is a verbatim rendering of the French and therefore disappointing. The informal style of the original version cannot be translated literally into English without losing clarity and readability. Moreover, the translation is at times so mechanical and ungrammatical that some expressions or even entire passages become almost unintelligible, e.g. "the differences jump before your eyes" (p. 189), "the forest does not have the capacity to store up thick ar6nes; on the contrary it favourizes (sic) total hydrolysis beneath its feet" (p. 161). It is also regrettable that the publication of the English edition was not made the occasion for up-dating the book. The original version, published in 1964, covers the literature up to the year 1962. In the course of the eight years which elapsed until the English translation was completed clay science has advanced rapidly. While it was probably impractical to revise the entire book, an additional chapter summarizing recent events would have been most welcome. Nevertheless,
232
BOOK REVIEWS
the book is indispensable to anyone concerned with the geology and geochemistry of clays and it is unfortunate that the translation does not do justice to the original. L. HELLER (Jerusalem)
Flysch Sedimentology in North America. J. LAJOIE (Editor). Business and Economic Service, Toronto, 1970 (Spec. Pap., No. 7. Geol. Assoc. Can.), 272 pp. The present publication is the result of a two-day symposium on flysch sedimentology, held in 1969 and sponsored by the Geological Association of Canada. In the introduction tbe editor states: " T h e primary objective of the symposium was to give N o r t h American sedimentologists an opportunity to compare results, present contrasting ideas, and assess problems related to flysch sedimentology. The symposium was not intended as a review of all work on flysch deposits in North America, or as a discussion on the definition of the term flysch". The book contains fourteen articles. Specialists, several of them with an outstanding reputation in the sedimentology of flysch and of turbidites, have written a book which has only one limitation, namely that it deals " o n l y " with North American examples. The present publication could only be considered to some extent as a textbook on flysch and turbidites; facts and ideas are brought forward by various authors in their contributions so that the organization of the book, if considered as a textbook, is not ideal. I only use the term " t e x t b o o k " to illusstrate the wealth of information and of ideas which make the reader realize the considerable progress made in our knowledge of these matters since the appearance of Bouma and Brouwer's Turbidites, No. 3 in the Developments in Sedimentolog)' Series (Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1964). The concept of fan deposition and the mechanisms of sand and gravel flow, and the lateral contact of their products with turbidite sequences show the progress made by the investigations of Dill, Dott, Stauffer and others. Hsii presents a clear review about the problems of terminology around the term "flysch". Nine papers then follow dealing with the filling of geosynclines which range in age from Early Paleozoic to Late Mesozoic; they are derived from areas spread over the whole North American continent. Most striking in the present volume is the impulse which the sedimemology of this kind of deposits has received from the hypotheses brought forward by our colleagues in megatectonics. Less than ten years ago the juxtaposition of finegrained and coarse-grained mass-movement deposits still remained in the descriptional phase. Now various authors have found an explanation with the help of the plate tectonics and sea-floor spreading concepts. Recent models are suggested of the depositional environments which exist along the tectonically relatively stable western North Atlantic as well as along the active eastern Pacific coasts. The distinction in different tectonic environments,