As a student, I was rearing at the bit, after a course on quantum mechanics, tolearn quantum field theory, but the books on the subject all seemed so formidable.Fortunately, I came across a little book by Mandl on field theory, which gaveme a taste of the subject enabling me to go on and tackle the more substantivetexts. I have since learned that other physicists of my generation had similar goodexperiences with Mandl.