[lbo-talk] [Marxism] Somewhat Off-Topic Request

[Mark Bennett]

It's been some years since I read it, but I don't recall Monk's biography
delving very deeply into Wittgenstein's thought.  Perhaps I should read it
again.  It does contain a great deal of very interesting biographical
material, some of it obscure, but even the well-known aspects of
Wittgenstein's life are given a fresh take.  For instance, Wittgenstein's
effect on Russell is the stuff of academic legend, but Monk documents just
how staggering the effect of Wittgenstein's thought was on Russell.  The war
years are well-covered, too, and the folly of war is rather dramatically
illustrated by the details of Wittgenstein's service in the trenches.  It
seems something of a miracle that he wasn't killed in the general
holocaust.

I haven't read this wildly Routledge volume, but for a Marxist perspective,
this would appear to be a good starting point:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FBFIM4/ref=pd_lpo_k2_dp_sr_1?pf_rd_p=486539851&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=0415247756&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1P3NRCB8N0HXZAXGZ7JJ

On Sat, Oct 15, 2011 at 6:35 PM, Jim Farmelant <farmelantj at juno.com> wrote:


>
> On Sun, 16 Oct 2011 01:13:35 +0100 (BST) Angelus Novus
> <fuerdenkommunismus at yahoo.com> writes:
> >
> >
> > Sorry for the strange request, but some of the smartest people I
> > know hang out on these lists, so:
> >
> > can anyone recommend some useful introductory/secondary literature
> > to the thought of Wittgenstein? (beyond Wikipedia, of course)
> >
> >
> > Is the Ray Monk biography useful in this regard, or is it purely
> > biographical and not much of an actual introduction in terms of
> > ideas?
> >
> > Plus points of course for anything written from a broadly Marxist
> > perspective. ;-)
> >
> >
>
> Yes, I would endorse Ray Monk's bio of Wittgenstein,
> unlike his Russell bio, which IMO is not so good because
> Monk's rather obvious hatred of Russell gets in his way there.
> And as I recall, Monk does get in Wittgenstein's ideas too.
> Concerning Wittgenstein's ideas, Anthony Kenny has a good
> introductory book on Wittgenstein's philosophy, that is simply
> titled, Wittgenstein, by Penguin Press.
>
> David Pears, who was a noted Wittgenstein scholar, wrote
> a good short intro book on him also simply titled, Wittgenstein.
> He also wrote more advanced studies of Wittgenstein's work
> like his,  The False Prison: A Study of the Development of
> Wittgenstein's Philosophy.
>
>
> Jim Farmelant
> http://independent.academia.edu/JimFarmelant
> www.foxymath.com
> Learn or Review Basic Math
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