Petrography rock was affixed to a microscope slide and then ground so thin that light could be transmitted through mineral grains that otherwise appeared opaque. The position of adjoining grains was not disturbed, thus permitting analysis of rock texture. Thin section petrography became the standard method of rock study. Since textural details contribute greatly to knowledge of the sequence of crystallization of the various mineral constituents in a rock, petrography progressed into petrogenesis and ultimately into petrology. It was in Europe, principally in Germany, that petrography advanced in the last half of the nineteenth century. The macroscopic characters of rocks, those
The World Is What It Is in 1996. The biography has been extensively reviewed: the reviewers include Paul Theroux, who wrote an earlier book about Naipaul. The biography was selected by the editors of the "New York Times Book Review" as one of the "Times"' "10 Best Books of 2008". It won the 2008 National Book Critics Circle Award in Biography, and the British literary award the Hawthornden Prize. The World Is What It Is The World Is What It Is: The Authorized Biography of V. S. Naipaul is a biography of the Nobel Prize-winning author V. S. Naipaul by Patrick French. It was published in