"I Think of You Constantly with Love": The Letters of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Ben Richards, 1946-1951

Ludwig Wittgenstein and Ben Richards met in the autumn of 1945, when Richards – a medical student – was attending one of Wittgenstein's courses. The 'loving friendship' (in Wittgenstein's words) which subsequently developed between them decisively coloured every aspect of Wittgenstein's last years.

Their correspondence – consisting of more than 370 letters, cards, and telegrams, along with numerous drawings and attachments – starts in the summer of 1946, and ends in April 1951, just a week before Wittgenstein's death. It gives an incomparably vivid and touching picture of the last five years
of Wittgenstein's life.

His encounter with Richards was perhaps the deepest love and the greatest happiness of Wittgenstein's life. And yet these letters also reveal Wittgenstein as a lonely, vulnerable, and often overbearing man, painfully aware of his dependence on the affection of his much younger beloved friend, and painfully aware of the fragility of their connection.

This collection of letters between Wittgenstein and Richards is not only the single largest correspondence of Wittgenstein's that has survived, but – more importantly – it is by far the most significant and revealing cache of letters between Wittgenstein and someone whom he loved romantically. They offer an entirely new window onto Wittgenstein's inner life, and a profound and moving testament to his emotional and intellectual concerns in his last years.

Like all of Wittgenstein's writings, the letters are shot through with opinions, humour, and insights, delivered in Wittgenstein's typically sharp and powerful manner. In short, this is a most remarkable collection of documents – both for those interested in Wittgenstein's philosophy, and for those interested in the life of one of the 20th century's greatest thinkers.

Ray Monk is a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Southampton, UK. He has published award-winning biographies of Ludwig Wittgenstein and Bertrand Russell. His most recent book is Inside the Centre: the Life of J. Robert Oppenheimer (2012, Jonathan Cape).