WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig Josef Johann (1889-1951). Autograph letter signed ('Ludwig Wittgenstein') to Alice Ambrose, n.p. [postmarked 'Cambridge'], 'Saturday' [17 June 1933], on lined paper, one page, 8°; autograph envelope. Provenance: Alice Ambrose Laserowitz (1906-2001; sale Doyle, 30 April 2002, lot 11).

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Ludwig Wittgenstein and Alice Ambrose and the Blue Book and the Brown Book I am sure [Alice Ambrose] will make a valuable, painstaking and patient teacher of philosophy, as she has acquired the rare capacity of seeing the extraordinary difficulty and complexity of philosophical problems. Her ability for philosophical research is well above the average. The problem of mathematical finitism which she has set herself to investigate is a central problem of modern philosophy (Ludwig Wittgenstein, lot 82) The trajectory of the teacher/student relationship between Wittgenstein and Ambrose which spanned the composition of the Blue Book and the Brown Book can be traced through the following four lots, from his gracious acceptances of invitations to supper (with the caveat that 'I have no evening dress'), congratulations on a scholarship, and plans for future classes in the lots 80 and 81, through the violent disagreement over Ambrose's publication of articles in Mind which Wittgenstein felt misrepresented his thought, and her decision not to continue working with him, thus ending the dictation of the Brown Book (lot 82) and 'perhaps contributing to changing the pattern of Wittgenstein's own work' (Brian McGuinness and G.H. von Wright, in: L. Wittgenstein Cambridge Letters (Oxford: 1995), p.261), to a letter written by Wittgenstein in 1937, wishing Ambrose a happy New Year -- 'I hope your work is going well & I hope you have forgiven me for inflicting pain upon you while you were at Cambridge' (lot 83). It appears that none of these letters are published (although Wittgenstein's note to Ambrose on the returned letter is quoted in a letter to Moore, cf. Cambridge Letters, no.153), and, further, that no correspondence between Wittgenstein and Ambrose can be traced in the principal repositories, including The Wren Library, Trinity College and Cambridge University Library, Cambridge; The National Library of Austria, Vienna; the Brenner Archive, University of Innsbruck, Austria; the Russell Archive, McMaster University, Ontario; the King's College Modern Record Centre, London. Alice Ambrose was born in Lexington, Illinois in 1906 and was educated at Millikin University (where she received her BA in 1928), and at the University of Wisconsin, where she received her MA and PhD. In 1932 she received a fellowship grant from Wellesley College which, combined with a studentship from Newnham College, enabled her to leave the University of Wisconsin in order to pursue post-doctoral research at Cambridge, supervised initially by Wittgenstein and later by G.E. Moore. Ambrose was soon absorbed into the inner circle of Wittgenstein's trusted students to whom he dictated the Blue Book in 1933-4 (the other members of the group were H.M.S. Coxeter, R.L. Goodstein, Margaret Masterman and Francis Skinner) and in 1934, 'Wittgenstein, with Skinner, came to me to propose a class with the two of us, the plan being to set down thoughts which might be definitive of what he had to say' (A. Ambrose and M. Lazerowitz Ludwig Wittgenstein. Philosophy and Language (London: 1972), p.22); she accepted, and the dictation of the Brown Book took place during that academic year. 'That year was a period of most intensive work. Dictation of what came to be known as the Brown Book occupied four days a week and took a minimum of two hours per day, most usually three or four. On days when he lectured we were with him as much as seven hours, and each day was exhausting to the three of us. We often had lunch together, in Skinner's rooms, or in Lyons in Petty Cury, or in my flat in the Braithwaites' house, at nearly four in the afternoon' (loc. cit.). Ambrose became increasingly aware that the intense intellectual effort and energy required to forge the text (effected by a combination of dictation by Wittgenstein and clarifications interjected by Ambrose and Skinner) was detrimental to work on her doctoral dissertation and the possibility of future employment: 'I had come to Cambridge at the base of the depression, the prospects for a teaching post were still meagre, and I was returning to America at the end of the academic year. Wittgenstein was aware of this, and offered to help me get on with the thesis' (A. Ambrose op. cit. p.23). G.E. Moore had accepted both parts of a paper which formed part of Ambrose's dissertation, and Part I, 'Finitism in Mathematics', was published in Mind in April, 1935, prefaced by the statement 'The view presented is guided throughout by certain suggestions made by Dr. Ludwig Wittgenstein in lectures delivered in Cambridge between 1932 and 1935'. As Ambrose relates: 'This paper drew heavily on what I thought I had learned from Wittgenstein. But on seeing it Wittgenstein [who had borrowed this issue of Mind from the Trinity College Library on 1 May 1935] considered it not to represent his views properly and not yet in a shape acceptable for publication' (loc. cit.); consequently, Wittgenstein proposed that Part II be delayed until it could be revised to reflect accurately his thought. Ambrose and Moore felt otherwise, and -- as she states in her letter to Wittgenstein of 16 May 1935 (lot 83) -- decided to proceed with publication of Part II and to withdraw from the dictation sessions. Work on the Brown Book ended and Wittgenstein resigned as the examiner of Ambrose's PhD. 'I saw him once more, for lunch at my flat on the day I left Cambridge in August, and parted with his blessing. But the magic circle was broken' (A. Ambrose op. cit. p.24).

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WITTGENSTEIN, Ludwig Josef Johann (1889-1951). Autograph letter signed ('Ludwig Wittgenstein') to Alice Ambrose, n.p. [postmarked 'Cambridge'], 'Saturday' [17 June 1933], on lined paper, one page, 8°; autograph envelope. Provenance: Alice Ambrose Laserowitz (1906-2001; sale Doyle, 30 April 2002, lot 11).

'P.S. I HAVE NO EVENING DRESS'. Wittgenstein acknowledges and accepts an invitation to dine from Ambrose, suggesting Thursday 22nd as a convenient date, and asking at what time he should come, adding, as a postscript, that he does not posses evening dress.

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