Abstract
The past 100 years are a key period for understanding climate variability and climate change as it marks the changeover from a climate system dominated by natural influences to one significantly dominated by anthropogenic activities. This volume is a compilation of contributions to a workshop dealing with different aspects of climate change, variability, and extremes during the past 100 years. The individual contributions cover a broad range of topics, from the re-evaluation of historical marine data to the effect of solar variability on the stratosphere. In this introductory chapter we provide an overview of the book in the context of recent research.