A brief history of Wittgenstein editing

Abstract

The article reflects on the history of the publication of Wittgenstein’sNachlass in the half-century after his death. It does not aim to be a completenarrative, but is based on the author’s personal experience of the process, asa translator and as a Trustee of Wittgenstein’s literary estate. It describes thecomplicated legal structures that have governed copyright in the Nachlass,and discusses the abortive Tubingen project and the eventual Wiener Ausgabeof certain texts. Finally it raises the question whether, now that the successful Bergen-Oxford electronic edition is available, there is any merit in aimingto produce a complete hard-copy Gesamtausgabe.