Wittgensteins Pre-Tractatus Writings

This volume brings into focus the unique philosophical and historical importance of Wittgenstein's pre-Tractatus writings. These contributed essays show that Wittgensteins earliest writings are worth studying for their own sake. They also reveal how much one can still learn about the Tractatus, if we are to study these early writings not as documenting ones prior interpretation of the Tractatus, but as a series of steps in Wittgensteins thought, some down paths that are later abandoned, some leading towards it. The volume thus offers not only a fresh perspective on the pre-Tractatus writings, but also a comprehensive reading of a wide range of central topics from the very first letters, the Notes on Logic, the Notes dictated to G.E. Moore to the three surviving war-time notebooks