''Remarks on Frazer's Golden Bough'' (german: Bemerkungen über Frazers "The Golden Bough") is a collection of
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Ludwig Josef Johann Wittgenstein ( ; ; 26 April 1889 – 29 April 1951) was an Austrian-British philosopher who worked primarily in logic, the philosophy of mathematics, the philosophy of mind, and the philosophy of language. He is considere ...
's thoughts on
James George Frazer
Sir James George Frazer (; 1 January 1854 – 7 May 1941) was a Scottish social anthropologist and folklorist influential in the early stages of the modern studies of mythology and comparative religion.
Personal life
He was born on 1 Janua ...
's ''
The Golden Bough: A Study in Magic and Religion''. The commentary was initially published in 1967, with an English edition in 1979. Wittgenstein wrote the text in the summer of 1931, which represented his earliest efforts to compose what would eventually become the ''
Philosophical Investigations'' (1953).
An important theme of the ''Remarks'', and one which Wittgenstein would later explore more fully, is the conception of metaphysics as a "kind of magic". The text was edited by
Rush Rhees
Rush Rhees (; 19 March 1905 – 22 May 1989) was an American philosopher. He is principally known as a student, friend, and literary executor of the philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein. With G. E. M. Anscombe he was co-editor of Wittgenstein's post ...
, who published them separately from Wittgenstein's other work, in a possible attempt to avoid alienating Wittgenstein's readership, in light of the sympathy shown to primitive thought and practices. In the ''Remarks'', Wittgenstein famously described Frazer as more savage than those he studied, and was exceptionally critical of Frazer's interpretations of primitive mythology, Christianity, and epistemology.
The remarks were later included in full in an anthology of Wittgenstein's miscellaneous work called ''Philosophical Occasions 1912-1951.'' The editors claim that Rush Rhees omitted a number of remarks from the bilingual book edition of the ''Remarks'', and include in their anthology some remarks they believe Rhees may have erroneously excluded.
Further reading
Ludwig Wittgenstein, ''The Mythology in Our Language. Remarks on Frazer’s Golden Bough'',
(German/English parallel text), Transl. by S. Palmié, Ed. by Giovanni da Col and S. Palmié, with critical reflections by V. Das, W. James, H. Kwon, M. Lambek, S. Laugier, K. Myhre,
R. Needham, M. Puett, C. Severi, and
M. Taussig, 2020, Hau Books
open access
External links
Original German text of the ''Remarks on Frazer's Golden Bough'' at the Ludwig Wittgenstein Project
References
{{Authority control
1967 non-fiction books
Books by Ludwig Wittgenstein