Table of Contents

The Thermodynamics of Black Holes.- to Quantum Fields in Curved Spacetime and the Hawking Effect.- Large N Field Theories, String Theory and Gravity.- Lectures on D-branes, Tachyon Condensation, and String Field Theory.- Billiard Dynamics of Einstein-Matter Systems Near a Spacelike Singularity.- Tall Tales from de Sitter Space.- Causal Sets: Discrete Gravity.- Thermaldecay of the Cosmological Constant into Black Holes.