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I've been trying to get into deformation theory lately, and I became thirsty for a bit of context.

Has Deformation Theory seen a lot of development since its inception? If I read Michael Artin's "Deformations of Singularities" - would that be representative of the understanding today?

To put it more pointedly: What is the outline of the evolution of deformation theory?

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 Here you go: math.columbia.edu/~doran/Hist%20Ann%20Bib.pdf – Kevin Lin Sep 30 2010 at 6:09
For more modern developments, see Kontsevich-Soibelman's book on deformation theory and Jacob Lurie's ICM talk. – Kevin Lin Sep 30 2010 at 6:13
It's a nice question. What was there pre-Kodaira-Spencer? There was quite a bit in geometry, I believe. What exactly is said in SGA1 (this is opaque to me, but I have wanted to know for a long time)? – Charles Matthews Sep 30 2010 at 10:14
have you noticed the first link has only the odd numbered pages? – roy smith Nov 9 2010 at 0:50
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 @Kevin Lin: The first link seems to no longer work. Any thoughts? (I tried looking at the authors website and it doesn't seem to be publicly posted there) – Sean Tilson Nov 1 at 1:25
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