Higher dimensional complex geometry Eduard Lo oijenga
Park City IAS Mathematics Series
Volume
Cohomology and intersection homology
of algebraic varieties
Eduard Lo oijenga
Intro duction
These is the write up of a series of lectures that intended to giveanoverview of the
algebraic top ology of complex algebraic varieties The most imp ortant to ol here is
the theory of Lefschetz p encils whichserves in algebraic geometry similar purp oses
as Morse theory in di erential top ology
The rst four lectures are devoted to the classical asp ects of this theory Lecture