Wittgenstein's Vienna,

History

Janik, Allan

Europe

Weidenfeld and Nicolson

Wittgenstein's Vienna Revisited

Fin de siecle Vienna was once memorably described by Karl Kraus as a "proving ground for the destruction of the world." In the decades leading to the World War that brought down the Austro-Hungarian empire, the city was at once an operetta dream world masking social and political problems and tension, as well as a center for the far-reaching explorations and innovations in music, art, science, and philosophy that would help to define modernity. One of the most powerful critiques of the retreat into fantasy was that of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, whose early career in Vienna has helped frame debates about ethical and aesthetic values in culture. In Wittgenstein's Vienna Revisited Allan Janik expands upon his work Wittgenstein's Vienna (co-authored with Stephen Toulmin) to amplify a number of significant points concerning the genesis of Wittgenstein's thought, the nature of Viennese culture, and criticism of contemporary culture. Although Wittgenstein is the central figure in this volume, Janik places considerable emphasis on other influential figures, both Viennese and non-Viennese, in order to break down some of the persistent stereotypes about the philosopher and his surrounding culture, especially the myths of "carefree" Vienna and Wittgenstein the positivist. The persistence of these myths, in Janik's view, stems in part from the inability of many historians to differentiate past from present in the evaluation of intellectual currents. Janik reviews a number of figures overlooked in assessing Wittgenstein: Otto Weininger, Kraus, Schoenberg, Nietzsche, Wagner, Ibsen, Offenbach, and Georg Trakl. All of these, Janik demonstrates, are absolutely necessary to understand what was at stake in the debates on aestheticism and the critique of a modern culture. Wittgenstein's efforts to recognize the limits of thought and language and thus to be fair to science, religion, and art account for his place of honor among critical modernists. These essays elucidate Wittgenstein's perspective on our culture.

Routledge

Fin de siecle Vienna was once memorably described by Karl Kraus as a "proving ground for the destruction of the world." In the decades leading to the World War that brought down the Austro-Hungarian empire, the city was at once an operetta dream world masking social and political problems and tension, as well as a center for the far-reaching explorations and innovations in music, art, science, and philosophy that would help to define modernity. One of the most powerful critiques of the retreat into fantasy was that of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein, whose early career in Vienna has helped frame debates about ethical and aesthetic values in culture. In Wittgenstein's Vienna Revisited Allan Janik expands upon his work Wittgenstein's Vienna (co-authored with Stephen Toulmin) to amplify a number of significant points concerning the genesis of Wittgenstein's thought, the nature of Viennese culture, and criticism of contemporary culture.Although Wittgenstein is the central figure in this volume, Janik places considerable emphasis on other influential figures, both Viennese and non-Viennese, in order to break down some of the persistent stereotypes about the philosopher and his surrounding culture, especially the myths of "carefree" Vienna and Wittgenstein the positivist. The persistence of these myths, in Janik's view, stems in part from the inability of many historians to differentiate past from present in the evaluation of intellectual currents. Janik reviews a number of figures overlooked in assessing Wittgenstein: Otto Weininger, Kraus, Schoenberg, Nietzsche, Wagner, Ibsen, Offenbach, and Georg Trakl. All of these, Janik demonstrates, are absolutely necessary to understand what was at stake in the debates on aestheticism and the critique of a modern culture.Wittgenstein's efforts to recognize the limits of thought and language and thus to be fair to science, religion, and art account for his place of honor among critical modernists. These essays elucidate Wittgenstein's perspective on our culture.

<p>Otto Weininger (1880-1903) is the most controversial figure to emerge from fin de siècle Vienna. The son of a Jewish goldsmith, he studied philosophy and psychology at the University of Vienna and spoke six languages by the time he was 21. After receiving his Ph.D. in 1902, he converted to Christianity and, in 1903, he published his book Sex and Character—a groundbreaking and highly provocative study that would come to influence Adolf Hitler, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and James Joyce, among others. As troubled as he was brilliant, Weininger took his own life on October 3, 1903, leaving behind a small number of works, an array of challenging ideas, and many unanswered questions.<br />
In Hitler’s Favorite Jew, Professor Allan Janik draws upon a half-century of research to explore the life and legacy of Otto Weininger, and to illuminate his outsized impact on some of the greatest thinkers and the greatest monster of the twentieth century. Janik explains how Weininger came to write his bizarre book featuring outrageous claims about women and Jews, and argues that, contrary to the received wisdom, Weininger’s true goal was progressive and humanistic.<br />
With its deep insights into both Weininger the man and Viennese intellectual life at the turn of the century, Hitler’s Favorite Jew offers a rich and multifaceted portrait that challenges our ideas about sexuality, the nature of anti-Semitism, and the puzzle of human identity.</p>

Hitler's Favorite Jew: The Enigma of Otto Weininger

Biographies & Memoirs

Professionals & Academics

Simply Charly

Essays on Wittgenstein and Weininger (Studien zur Oesterreichischen Philosophie)

Editions Rodopi

Astonishingly, Wittgenstein insisted that he was not an original thinker but one who passionately seized upon the thoughts of truly original thinkers with a view to developing a method of conceptual clarification. He compared his mind to fertile ground in which the seeds of the truly original: Ludwig Boltzmann, Heinrich Hertz, Arthur Schopenhauer, Gottlob Frege, Bertrand Russell, Karl Kraus, Adolf Loos, Otto Weininger, Oswald Spengler and Piero Sraffa, could blossom. Assembling Reminders is the first full length study to explore how these figures influenced Wittgenstein - but also how he could claim to have understood them better than they did themselves. It illuminates Wittgenstein's uniqueness in the history of 20th century thought at the same time that it clarifies his relationship to both analytical and Continental philosophy as well as to Viennese critical modernism. Allan Janik, (1941) is currently Research Fellow at the University of Innsbruck's Brenner Archives Reseach Institute. He is also Adjunct Professor for the Philosophy of Culture at the University of Vienna and at the Skill and technology Ph D. program at Stockholm's Royal Institute of Technology.

Assembling Reminders: Studies in the Genesis of Wittgensteins Concept of Philosophy

Politics & Social Sciences

Philosophy

Santerus Academic Pr

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