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 whatwas 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.

【作者简介】

阿兰•雅尼克（Allan Janik，1941— ）生于美国马萨诸塞州奇科皮，先后毕业于圣安塞姆学院、维拉诺瓦大学和布兰迪斯大学。他曾在喇沙书院和韦尔斯利学院教授哲学和思想史，现为奥地利因斯布鲁克大学布伦纳档案研究委员会的一员。另著有《提示汇编：对维特根斯坦哲学概念起源的研究》（Assembling Reminders: Studies in the Genesis of Wittgenstein's Concept of Philosophy）、《隐喻的运用和滥用》（The Use and Abuse of Metaphor）、《哲学的风格、政治和未来》（Style, Politics and the Future of Philosophy）等。

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斯蒂芬•图尔敏（Stephen Toulmin，1922—2009）英国哲学家、作家、教育家，生于伦敦，毕业于剑桥大学。曾在牛津大学、墨尔本大学、利兹大学、布兰迪斯大学、密歇根州立大学、芝加哥大学和南加利福尼亚大学哲学任教。他生前主要致力于道德理性的研究，出版过二十余部著作，涉及领域广泛，其中包括《回归理性》（Return to Reason）、《都市：现代性的隐藏议题》（Cosmopolis: The Hidden Agenda of Modernity）、《前瞻和理解：拷问科学的目的》（Foresight and Understanding: An Enquiry into the Aims of Science）等。

【译者简介】

殷亚迪，博士，就读于浙江大学公共管理学院政治学系政治学理论专业。另有译著《欧洲商贩史》。