Introduction for 41st Rankine Lecture 21 March 2001

The 41st Rankine Lecture of the British Geotechnical Association was given by Professor Heinz Brandl at Imperial College, London, on 21 March 2001. The following introduction was given by Professor R J Mair of the University of Cambridge.

It gives me great pleasure to introduce Professor Heinz Brandl, the 41st Rankine Lecturer.

Heinz Brandl was born in Southern Moravia, now the Czech Republic, in 1940. As a small boy he experienced the bitter consequences of the Second World War. In 1945 he was forced to leave the country of his birth under what were clearly extremely difficult circumstances, and settled...