The present book grew out of several courses which I have taught at the
University of Zürich and at the University of Maryland during the past
seven years. It is primarily intended to be a systematic text on locally
convex spaces at the level of a student who has some familiarity with
general topology and basic measure theory. However, since much of the
material is of fairly recent origin and partly appears here for the
first time in a book, and also since some well-known material has been
given a not so well-known treatment, I hope that this book might prove
useful even to more advanced readers. And in addition I hope that the
selection ofmaterial marks a sufficient set-offfrom the treatments in
e.g. N. Bourbaki [4], [5], R.E. Edwards [1], K. Floret-J. Wloka
[1], H.G.Garnir-M.De Wilde-J.Schmets [1], AGrothendieck [13],
H.Heuser [1], J. Horvath [1], J. L. Kelley-I. Namioka et al. [1],
G. Köthe [7], [10], A P. Robertson- W.Robertson [1], W.Rudin
[2], H.H.Schaefer [1], F.Treves [l], A Wilansky [1]. A few
sentences should be said about the organization of the book. It consists
of 21 chapters which are grouped into three parts. Each chapter splits
into several sections. Chapters, sections, and the statements therein
are enumerated in consecutive fashion.