WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig, Wörterbuch für Volksschulen, edited and introduced by Adolf Hübner (Hölder-Pichler-Tempsky, Vienna), 1977 [first thus]

144 x 208mm; pp. xxxv, [2], 42

Wittgenstein’s dictionary. Remarkably this and the Tractatus are the only two books published in Wittgenstein’s lifetime. After completing the Tractatus Wittgenstein left Cambridge, philosophy, and his family fortune and moved to rural Austria to become a school-teacher. This followed naturally from the fact that he felt that the Tractatus was a final statement not only of his theory of meaning but also his notion of an ‘ethical’ philosophy.

This reissue of the vanishingly scarce 1926 printing includes a facsimile of the original dictionary, as well as English translations of the preface, and of Adolf Hübner’s useful introduction. Strange as it may seem, this is an important source for understanding Wittgenstein’s intellectual development: Wittgenstein was at this time strict about the limits of language, and was also clearly thinking about ‘families’ or groups of words, a concept used to organize the dictionary, and also to explore an idea that would be developed fully in the later concept of a ‘philosphical grammar’.

Very good condition: spine edges worn, otherwise clean and bright.