In July 1996, a conference was organized by the editors of this volume at the Mathematische Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach to honour Egbert Brieskorn on the occasion of his 60th birthday. Most of the mathematicians invited to the conference have been influenced in one way or another by Brieskorn's work in singularity theory. It was the first time that so many people from the Russian school could be present at a conference in singularity theory outside Russia. This volume contains papers on singularity theory and its applications, written by participants of the conference. In many cases, they are extended versions of the talks presented there. The diversity of subjects of the contributions reflects singularity theory's relevance to topology, analysis and geometry, combining ideas and techniques from all of these fields, as well as demonstrating the breadth of Brieskorn's own interests. This volume contains papers on singularity theory and its applications, written by participants of the conference. In many cases, they are extended versions of the talks presented there. The diversity of subjects of the contributions reflects singularity theory's relevance to topology, analysis and geometry, combining ideas and techniques from all of these fields, as well as demonstrates the breadth of Brieskorn's own interests.

The text of this book has its origins more than twenty- ve years ago. In the seminar of the Dutch Singularity Theory project in 1982 and 1983, the second-named author gave a series of lectures on Mixed Hodge Structures and Singularities, accompanied by a set of hand-written notes. The publication of these notes was prevented by a revolution in the subject due to Morihiko Saito: the introduction of the theory of Mixed Hodge Modules around 1985. Understanding this theory was at the same time of great importance and very hard, due to the fact that it uni es many di erent theories which are quite complicated themselves: algebraic D-modules and perverse sheaves. The present book intends to provide a comprehensive text about Mixed Hodge Theory with a view towards Mixed Hodge Modules. The approach to Hodge theory for singular spaces is due to Navarro and his collaborators, whose results provide stronger vanishing results than Deligne s original theory. Navarro and Guill en also lled a gap in the proof that the weight ltration on the nearby cohomology is the right one. In that sense the present book corrects and completes the second-named author s thesis."

This is the first comprehensive basic monograph on mixed Hodge structures. Starting with a summary of classic Hodge theory from a modern vantage point the book goes on to explain Deligne's mixed Hodge theory. Here proofs are given using cubical schemes rather than simplicial schemes. Next come Hain's and Morgan's results on mixed Hodge structures related to homotopy theory. Steenbrink's approach of the limit mixed Hodge structure is then explained using the language of nearby and vanishing cycle functors bridging the passage to Saito's theory of mixed Hodge modules which is the subject of the last chapter. Since here D-modules are essential, these are briefly introduced in a previous chapter. At various stages applications are given, ranging from the Hodge conjecture to singularities. The book ends with three large appendices, each one in itself a resourceful summary of tools and results not easily found in one place in the existing literature (homological algebra, algebraic and differential topology, stratified spaces and singularities). The book is intended for advanced graduate students, researchers in complex algebraic geometry as well as interested researchers in nearby fields (algebraic geometry, mathematical physics