Edward Kanterian has done something essential and quite extraordinary with this new biography, and that is he focuses on Wittgenstein's religious sensibilities, revealing the philosopher's strong convictions to keep his spiritual concerns separate from his philosophy. The author also spotlights Wittgenstein's four love relationships, their intenseness, their joy and the deep suffering the man experienced when they ended, two of which, tragically.
The reader should also consider that Wittgenstein has become an industry for academics and journalists comprising to date over 10,000 secondary sources (including a feature film) on the man's work and his life. Kanterian also examines this phenomenon and proposes possible reasons for this plethora of interpretation and interest for Wittgenstein and his work.
Wittgenstein's first true relationship and closest personal friend in the early years before WW1 was the young David Pinsent. Pinsent was a brilliant undergraduate in mathematics, (and a descendant of the famous 18th century philosopher, David Hume) who assisted Wittgenstein in certain experiments. He was also the philosopher's travel companion: very sensitive and a good listener, tragically the boy died in an aeroplane accident in 1918.
Frances Skinner was more than likely the most important person in Wittgenstein's life. He was a mathematician of great potential, a student at Cambridge to become a Wittgenstein "disciple". Wittgenstein told the boy to drop mathematics' and academic life and work with his hands. He followed this advice against the wishes of his parents and other friends. Unfortunately after some years of working and living together, Wittgenstein required distance from the relationship however received word that his beloved Frances died of poliomyelitis in October 1941. Wittgenstein never truly recovered from this loss.
The third important relationship was with an Austrian high society woman by the name of Marguerite Respinger. There is a diary entry included in this book that really expresses Wittgenstein's feeling for her. Of course they never married but remained good friends.
Ben Richards was the fourth intense relationship and Wittgenstein's last. Richards was a strikingly handsome lad, studying medicine at Cambridge. He is described as kind, sensitive and considerate. Wittgenstein felt a selfless love for Richards and when the boy (40 years Wittgenstein's junior) moved on from the relationship, Wittgenstein's letters and diary entries reveal a man with a broken heart - all very moving.
What these diary entries about his relationships reveal is a man capable of a deep kind of love, a joy and suffering simultaneously felt, as only a deep love can create. What I found extraordinary was that Wittgenstein was so cerebral, a master of logic, an accomplished engineer and architect, however was capable of such intense feeling in his relationships and music. I found Kanterian's book to reveal this aspect of the philosopher more so than the other biographies.
To Kanterian's great credit, his expositions on Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico Philosophicus and Philosophical Investigations are more than likely the most clearly explained interpretations I've ever encountered, making these notoriously difficult works, clear and comprehensible - a pure joy to read.
Ludwig Wittgenstein by Edward Kanterian as part of the Critical Lives Series is a notable contribution to the life and works of the famous philosopher and a text useful for someone thinking about embarking on the Wittgenstein Quest.
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