Just about everyone connected with the LANA project seems to have got an additional publication to list on his or her CV as a result of Language Learning by a Chimpanzee, so the book has served one purpose. Instead of presenting a scholarly report, it is largely anecdotal and presents many opinions unsupported by evidence. Furthermore, it is often meticulously attentive to stupendously boring detail:“Warner attended a one-week crash course in computer interfacing given at the Georgia Institute of Technology, which consisted of five 8-hour days, four 3-hour evenings and an 8-hour weekend”(p. 145).

The text appears to have been written in 1975, and gives the impression of a progress report.(I) There is a detailed description of Lana’s quarters, her “machine”, and the computer programs involved in the project. The casual reader can, however, learn all he needs to know to understand the results from the fine photograph on the book’s cover; and any reader with a passionate interest in the technical minutiae (due perhaps to a desire to, ahem, ape the undertaking) would no doubt visit the Yerkes Laboratory and inspect the set-up in person.(2) There is an account of Yerkish, the artificial language developed for the project.(3) Five chapters report results of the study, often in a rather informal manner but quite clearly.(4) There are several chapters of a more theoretical nature.