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Comment by jcynix | Hacker News Reader

The bibliography contains a typo, namely entry 5 misses an "l" in Allegro.

And a book, which I'd call "an Oldie but Goldie" could be added: John Allen's "Anatomy of Lisp" (1978) which still is an excellent read for those who want to dive deep into Lisp's interna. One might also call it a precursor of SICP, as it covers a number of introductory topics too.

Abstract: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/542865

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I agree that John Allen’s book was incredibly useful 40 years ago to explain some of the nitty-gritty of implementing Lisp languages, but I can’t really recommend it today. The Genius of Lisp is fun and entertaining - something that I would recommend for the modern reader who wants material on the essence of Lisp languages with interesting history.

Adding it to the bibliography would be great, I just didn’t like the idea of someone seeing your comment, ordering a used copy of the very old Allen book and not enjoying it.

It's well worth a read for anyone who wants to implement their own Lisp. I'd say it's the precursor of Lisp In Small Pieces by Christian Queinnec though. I have copies of both.

And here's some interesting background info on the late John Allen which I just stumbled upon:

John Allen (1937-2022) and Anatomy of LISP https://mcjones.org/dustydecks/archives/2024/04/11/1249/

excellent. Also cool that Allen wrote TCL Lisp.

And it's worth pointing out here that the book itself is now freely available: https://dl.acm.org/doi/book/10.5555/542865

Maybe I’m missing something, but that webpage only seems to provide a PDF containing the beginning of the book (up through the Preface). Perhaps you need a ACM Digital Library Premium subscription to access the entire book?

Sigh -- they keep changing the rules. I think you have to have a free ACM account. If you send me an email (see my home page in my profile), I'll send you a PDF.

I appreciate your offer, but there’s no need. I subsequently found a copy here:

https://softwarepreservation.computerhistory.org/LISP/book/A...

I should have given this link also: https://softwarepreservation.computerhistory.org/LISP/book/A...

Thanks! I'm getting a lot of references here, I guess a next edition will at the very least come with a longer bibliography :)

Thanks for pointing it out. It's on the edits list for the next round :)

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