One of the most influential philosophers of the twentieth
century, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and the roots of his monumental
Tractatus are explored in this imaginative work. Oxaal picks up on
themes developed in an earlier work of his on Jews, Anti-Semitism
and Culture in Vienna, adding to it special issues concerning
Wittgenstein's experiences in Norway in 1913-14, where he worked on
ideas that were completed during the war. Oxaal situates the great
philosopher in time, place, and attitude, showing how his personal
background came to bear on the writing of the Tractatus.
Wittengenstein has often been criticized for traces of solipsism
and even mysticism, and Oxaal also examines these issues in a
volume that integrates ethnography, nationality, and cultural
studies.
Oxaal sheds new light on the theme of Wittgenstein's Jewishness,
and develops a new appreciation of the Wittgenstein family and
Wittgenstein's better-known years in Vienna. The author is
unsparing in his observations about racism and pessimism in Berlin
and Great Britian during the period in which Wittgenstein worked
and studied at Cambridge.
The writing of the Tractatus spanned the First World War. In the
period immediately after its completion, Wittgenstein found himself
in The Hague where he was in discussions and disputes with Bertrand
Russell. Oxaal covers these problems sensitively and with an
appreciation of ambiguities in the life of a great philosopher and
the confusions caused by a post-war change in fortunes--personal
and familial. This work of an eminent social scientist and
historian may not be the final statement on Wittgenstein, but it
most certainly must be considered in any serious assessments of an
iconic figure of the twentieth century.
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