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Yorick Smythies (21 February 1917 – 1980) was a student and friend 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 con ...
known for his notes of the philosopher's lectures. He was also a friend of, and character inspiration for, the novelist (and philosopher)
Iris Murdoch Dame Jean Iris Murdoch ( ; 15 July 1919 – 8 February 1999) was an Irish and British novelist and philosopher. Murdoch is best known for her novels about good and evil, sexual relationships, morality, and the power of the unconscious. Her ...
.


Life


Childhood

Yorick Smythies was born on 21 February 1917 in
Shanklin Shanklin () is a seaside resort and civil parish on the Isle of Wight, England, located on Sandown Bay. Shanklin is the southernmost of three settlements which occupy the bay, and is close to Lake and Sandown. The sandy beach, its Old Village ...
on the
Isle of Wight The Isle of Wight ( ) is a Counties of England, county in the English Channel, off the coast of Hampshire, from which it is separated by the Solent. It is the List of islands of England#Largest islands, largest and List of islands of England#Mo ...
where Yorick's maternal grandparents were living at the time.''Aeronautics''. King Sell & Olding, Limited. 8 March 1916.
"An engagement is announced between Captain B. E. Smythies, Royal Engineers and Royal Flying Corps, son of Mr. and Mrs A. Smythies of Dolton, North Devon, and Kate Marjorie ("Joe"), younger daughter of Mr and Mrs. W. A. Gouldsmith, of The Bungalow, Shanklin, Isle of Wight."
''The_Aeroplane,''_Temple_Press,_v.10_1916
/ref>_Yorick_was_the_first_child_of_Kate_Marjorie_"Joe"_Smythies_''née''_Gouldsmith,_(1892–1975)_and_ ''The_Aeroplane,''_Temple_Press,_v.10_1916
/ref>_Yorick_was_the_first_child_of_Kate_Marjorie_"Joe"_Smythies_''née''_Gouldsmith,_(1892–1975)_and_Commander#Royal_Air_Force">Cmdr_ Commander_(commonly_abbreviated_as_Cmdr.)_is_a_common_naval_officer_rank._Commander_is_also_used_as_a_rank_or_title_in_other_formal_organizations,_including_several_police_forces._In_several_countries_this_naval_rank_is_termed_frigate_captain. _...
_Bernard_Edward_Smythies_Distinguished_Flying_Cross_(United_Kingdom).html" ;"title="Commander#Royal_Air_Force.html" "title="ngagement also announced i
''The Aeroplane,'' Temple Press, v.10 1916
/ref> Yorick was the first child of Kate Marjorie "Joe" Smythies ''née'' Gouldsmith, (1892–1975) and Cmdr_ Commander_(commonly_abbreviated_as_Cmdr.)_is_a_common_naval_officer_rank._Commander_is_also_used_as_a_rank_or_title_in_other_formal_organizations,_including_several_police_forces._In_several_countries_this_naval_rank_is_termed_frigate_captain. _...
_Bernard_Edward_Smythies_Distinguished_Flying_Cross_(United_Kingdom)">DFC_who_had_been_born_in_1886_in_Dehradun,_India.html" ;"title="Commander#Royal Air Force">Cmdr Commander (commonly abbreviated as Cmdr.) is a common naval officer rank. Commander is also used as a rank or title in other formal organizations, including several police forces. In several countries this naval rank is termed frigate captain. ...
 Bernard Edward Smythies Distinguished Flying Cross (United Kingdom)">DFC who had been born in 1886 in Dehradun, India">Dehradum, India. Bernard, the younger brother of E. A. Smythies and elder brother of Richard Dawkins' paternal grandmother Edith, was a decorated Royal Air Force, RAF pilot who was killed in a flying accident at North Weald Airfield on 17 June 1930. As well as being survived by his wife, son, and brother, Bernard "Bunny" Smythies would be survived by his father Arthur Smythies (1847- 1934) and by his daughter, Yorick's younger sister. Yorick was educated at Harrow.
King's College, Cambridge Annual Report 2008
', pp. 206-206


University

Smythies began the Moral Sciences
Tripos At the University of Cambridge, a Tripos (, plural 'Triposes') is any of the examinations that qualify an undergraduate for a bachelor's degree or the courses taken by a student to prepare for these. For example, an undergraduate studying mathe ...
at
King's College, Cambridge King's College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Formally The King's College of Our Lady and Saint Nicholas in Cambridge, the college lies beside the River Cam and faces out onto King's Parade in the centre of the cit ...
in 1935, graduating with a First in philosophy in 1939. Smythies attended, and took detailed notes of,
Max Newman Maxwell Herman Alexander Newman, FRS, (7 February 1897 – 22 February 1984), generally known as Max Newman, was a British mathematician and codebreaker. His work in World War II led to the construction of Colossus, the world's first operatio ...
's 1935 lecture course on logic. Smythies also attended Wittgenstein's lectures in the academic year 1935/36 but (Wittgenstein not normally allowing students to take them in class) his notes of those lectures are sketchy. Wittgenstein was absent from Cambridge academic life from the autumn of 1936.. He returned in early 1938 and Smythies began to take more detailed notes of his lectures from that year. And (although Smythies completed his formal studies in 1939) he continued to do so through the academic year of 1939/1940 and took some further notes during a temporary return to Cambridge between late 1940 and early 1941. (Though Smythies attended lectures by Wittgenstein between 1945 and 1947, according to Volker A. Munz, he "seems to have made little or no notes" during this last period of Wittgenstein's professorship.) Being one of the few students Wittgenstein allowed to take lecture notes (and, at times, the only one), his notes became key sources for the reconstruction of Wittgenstein's lectures. During his lifetime, some of Smythies' notes were incorporated into ''Lectures and Conversations on Aesthetics, Psychology and Religious Belief'' (1966) and ''Lectures on the Foundations of Mathematics'' (1976) both being works edited by others. Further notes of Wittgenstein's lectures taken by Smythies were published in 1988 as ''Lectures on Freedom of the Will.'' However, a large body of notes, mostly from the period 1938 to 1940, which Smythies called the ''Whewell's Court Lectures'' (after the location at
Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any college at either Cambridge or Oxford. ...
where Wittgenstein's lectures were held) were only published in 2017 under the editorship of Volker A. Munz and his assistant Bernhard Ritter. Smythies also became a close friend to Wittgenstein. They conducted an intense written correspondence (most of it now thought lost). And Smythies was, with a few other former students, at Wittgenstein's bedside around the time of his death. Although Smythies delivered talks to the Cambridge Moral Sciences Club, taught philosophy part-time at Oxford in 1944 (on the philosophy of George Berkeley) and for Advanced Student Summer Courses between 1955 and 1957 he never became a professional lecturer and worked mainly as a librarian (latterly at the department of social studies at the
University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...
). And although he wrote philosophy of his own, some intended for publication, only a review of
Bertrand Russell Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell, (18 May 1872 – 2 February 1970) was a British mathematician, philosopher, logician, and public intellectual. He had a considerable influence on mathematics, logic, set theory, linguistics, ...
's ''
History of Western Philosophy Western philosophy encompasses the philosophical thought and work of the Western world. Historically, the term refers to the philosophical thinking of Western culture, beginning with the ancient Greek philosophy of the pre-Socratics. The word '' ...
'' is known to have been published during his lifetime. Smythies' review of the ''History'' was, as Ray Monk records, particularly "scathing" (and one Russell kept a copy of).


Religion

Like G.E.M. Anscombe, Smythies was a convert to Catholicism.


Mental Health

Ray Monk Ray Monk (born 15 February 1957) is a British biographer who is renowned for his biographies of Ludwig Wittgenstein, Bertrand Russell, and J. Robert Oppenheimer. He is emeritus professor of philosophy at the University of Southampton, where he ...
's claim (repeated by Peter J. Conradi and Valerie Purton) that Smythies suffered from (paranoid)
schizophrenia Schizophrenia is a mental disorder characterized by continuous or relapsing episodes of psychosis. Major symptoms include hallucinations (typically hearing voices), delusions, and disorganized thinking. Other symptoms include social wit ...
is disputed by Volker A. Munz. Neither Monk nor Munz offer any explanation for why Smythies might been thought to suffer from this condition, nor, accordingly, does Munz offer any alternative diagnosis. Conradi however identifies a "schizophrenic breakdown" as the cause of Yorick 'hiding behind trees' and "making strange utterances" and mentions time spent by him in a mental hospital. An explanation is offered by Yorick's first cousin, the
neuropsychiatrist Neuropsychiatry or Organic Psychiatry is a branch of medicine that deals with psychiatry as it relates to neurology, in an effort to understand and attribute behavior to the interaction of neurobiology and social psychology factors. Within neuro ...
J. R. Smythies who, also disputing Monk's claims of schizophrenia, claimed that, prescribed amphetamines for depression, Yorick Smythies became dependent on them and subsequently developed a "wholly
iatrogenic Iatrogenesis is the causation of a disease, a harmful complication, or other ill effect by any medical activity, including diagnosis, intervention, error, or negligence. "Iatrogenic", ''Merriam-Webster.com'', Merriam-Webster, Inc., accessed 27 ...
" chronic paranoid amphetamine psychosis.


Marriages

Smythies married his first wife Diana Pollard (known as 'Polly') in 1944, in Oxford. Diana was the daughter of the British Intelligence officer Hugh Pollard and had, aged eighteen, accompanied her father in posing as tourists to 'camouflage' the covert flight from England that collected
General Franco Francisco Franco Bahamonde (; 4 December 1892 – 20 November 1975) was a Spanish general who led the Nationalist forces in overthrowing the Second Spanish Republic during the Spanish Civil War and thereafter ruled over Spain from 193 ...
from his 'semi-banishment' in the Canary Islands and took him to Spanish Morocco in 1936. The marriage would end in divorce but Diana continued to live in
North Oxford North Oxford is a suburban part of the city of Oxford in England. It was owned for many centuries largely by St John's College, Oxford and many of the area's Victorian houses were initially sold on leasehold by the College. Overview The le ...
until her death in 2003. In 1974 Smythies married his second wife, Margaret 'Peg' Smythies ''née'' Britton (the ex-wife of Barry Pink, a friend to both Wittgenstein and Yorick) by whom Yorick had already had a son Daniel in 1963. Peg would survive Yorick and go on to marry another friend and former student of Wittgenstein, the philosopher
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 pos ...
. Peg would also survive Rhees (who died in 1989) dying in May 2014 having lived latterly in Amberley, Gloucestershire, near Stroud.


Death

Volker A. Munz, insists (contrary to the claims of Ray Monk) that "there were no tragic circumstances" surrounding Smythies death, reporting: "Having been afflicted with emphisema for about five years and knowing not to live much longer he died in 1980." Yorick is registered as dying late that year, in, or near,
Chipping Norton Chipping Norton is a market town and civil parish in the Cotswold Hills in the West Oxfordshire district of Oxfordshire, England, about south-west of Banbury and north-west of Oxford. The 2011 Census recorded the civil parish population as ...
.


In literature

Smythies was the basis for the character Hugo Belfounder in the novel '' Under the Net'' (1954) by Iris Murdoch. When Smythies died in 1980 Murdoch wrote the character's death into her novel '' The Philosopher's Pupil'' which she was then composing.


References


External links


Yorick Smythies (1917–1980)
by Volker A. Munz and Bernhard Ritter (''Wittgenstein's Whewell's Court Lectures'' project)
Front Matter
(including the Preface and Editorial Introduction) to
Wittgenstein's Whewell's Court Lectures: Cambridge, 1938–1941, From the Notes by Yorick Smythies
'' (2017) Volker A. Munz and Bernhard Ritter (ed.)
Lectures on Knowledge ⟨Easter Term 1938)
''Wittgenstein's Whewell's Court Lectures: Cambridge, 1938–1941, From the Notes by Yorick Smythies,'' (2017) Volker A. Munz and Bernhard Ritter (ed.)
Yorick Smythies' review of Russell's ''History''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Smythies, Yorick 1917 births 1980 deaths People educated at Harrow School 20th-century English philosophers English librarians