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The Duty of Genius From the book by Ray Monk: "Ludwig Wittgenstein - The Duty Of Genius" A copy of the book's "Introduction" The figure of Ludwig Wittgenstein exerts a very special fascination that is not wholly explained by the enormous influence he has had on the development of philosophy this century. Even those quite unconcerned with analytical philosophy find him compelling. Poems have been written about him, paintings inspired by him, his work has been set to music, and he has been made the central character in a successful novel that is little more than a fictionalized biography (The World as I Found It, by Bruce Duffy). In addition, there have been at least five television programmes made about him and countless memoirs of him written, often by people who knew him only very slightly. (F. R. Leavis, for example, who met him on perhaps four or five occasions, has made his "Memories of Wittgenstein" the subject of a sixteen-page article.) Recollections of Wittgenstein have been published by the lady who taught him Russian, the man who delivered peat to his cottage in Ireland and the man who did not know him very well, though happened to take the last photographs of him. All this is, in a way, quite separate from the ongoing industry of producing commentaries on Wittgenstein's philosophy. This industry, however, continues apace. A recent bibliography of secondary sources lists no fewer than 5,868 articles and books on his work. Very few of these would be of interest (or even intelligible) to anyone outside academia, and equally few of them would concern themselves with the aspects of Wittgenstein's life and personality that have inspired the work mentioned in the previous paragraph. It seems, then, that interest in Wittgenstein, great though it is, suffers from an unfortunate polarity between those who study his work in isolation from his life and those who find his life fascinating but his work unintelligible. It is a common experience, I think, for someone to read, say, Norman Malcolm's Memoir, to find themselves captivated by the figure described therein, and then be inspired to read Wittgenstein's work for themselves, only to find that they cannot understand a word of it. There are, it has to be said, many excellent introductory books on Wittgenstein's work that would explain what his main philosophical themes are, and how he deals with them. What they do not explain is what his work has to do with him - what the connections are between the spiritual and ethical preoccupations that dominate his life, and the seemingly rather remote philosophical questions that dominate his work. The aim of this book is to bridge that gap. By describing the life and the work in the one narrative, I hope to make it clear how this work came from this man, to show - what many who read Wittgenstein's work instinctively feel - the unity of his philosophical concerns with his emotional and spiritual life. Ray Monk: Ludwig Wittgenstein - The Duty Of Genius First published by Jonathan Cape Ltd, 1990 Vintage Books
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