The new edition of this celebrated and long-unavailable book preserves the original book's content and structure and its unrivalled presentation of a universal method for the resolution of a class of singularities in algebraic geometry.
Introduces uniform constructions of most of the known compactifications of symmetric and locally symmetric spaces, with emphasis on their geometric and topological structures Relatively self-contained reference aimed at graduate students and research mathematicians interested in the applications of Lie theory and representation theory to analysis, number theory, algebraic geometry and algebraic topology
The new edition of this celebrated and long-unavailable book preserves the original book's content and structure and its unrivalled presentation of a universal method for the resolution of a class of singularities in algebraic geometry. At the same time, the book has been completely re-typeset, errors have been eliminated, proofs have been streamlined, the notation has been made consistent and uniform, an index has been added, and a guide to recent literature has been added. The book brings together ideas from algebraic geometry, differential geometry, representation theory and number theory, and will continue to prove of value for researchers and graduate students in these areas.
What do the classification of algebraic surfaces, Weyl's dimension formula and maximal orders in central simple algebras have in common? All are related to a type of manifold called locally mixed symmetric spaces in this book. The presentation emphasizes geometric concepts and relations and gives each reader the "roter Faden", starting from the basics and proceeding towards quite advanced topics which lie at the intersection of differential and algebraic geometry, algebra and topology. Avoiding technicalities and assuming only a working knowledge of real Lie groups, the text provides a wealth of examples of symmetric spaces. The last two chapters deal with one particular case (Kuga fiber spaces) and a generalization (elliptic surfaces), both of which require some knowledge of algebraic geometry. Of interest to topologists, differential or algebraic geometers working in areas related to arithmetic groups, the book also offers an introduction to the ideas for non-experts.