The Nature and Origin of Granite

The origin of granite has for long fascinated geologists though serious debate on the topic may be said to date from a famous meeting of the Geological Society of France in 1847. My own introduction to the subject began exactly one hundred years later when, in an interview with Profes­ sor H. H. Read, I entered his study as an amateur fossil collector and left it as a committed granite petrologist - after just ten minutes! I can hardly aspire to convert my reader in so dramatic a way, yet t...