liquid crystals, widely used in displays for electronic equipment and other applications, have highly unusual properties arising from the anisotropy of their molecules. it appears that some aspects of the fluid dynamics of liquid crystals, such as their viscosity, can be understood only by considering the role played by thermal fluctuations. in order to provide a theoretical framework for understanding the experimental results, the authors devote a large part of the book to a derivation of the nonlinear dynamic equations and to a discussion of linearized equations for the various types of liquid crystals. the diagrammatic and other techniques they use are of general use in condensed matter physics, and this exposition should thus be of interest to all condensed-matter theorists.