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In the forward to the third edition of his Undergraduate Algebra, Lang mentions:

A new section in Chapter IV gives a complete account of the Mason-Stothers theorem about polynomials, with Noah Snyder's beautifully simple proof. It is worth emphasizing that the derivative for polynomials is a purely algebraic operation, for which limits are not required. A Springer pamphlet has been published to present a self-contained treatment of polynomials (from scratch) culminating with this topic.

What publication is he referring to?

Jeff Clites
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  • That proof was already known long before Snyder's publication. It is obvious if one is familiar with Wronskian dependence measures, e.g. see my 1996 sci.math post excerpted in this answer. – Bill Dubuque Dec 03 '22 at 08:18

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Perhaps it is the following article (at least, Serge Lang is talking about it):

Noah Snyder An alternate proof of Mason’s theorem, Elem. Math. 55 (2000), 93–94; Springer Verlag.

This gives a ‘proof from the Book’ for Mason’s ABC theorem.

Dietrich Burde
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