Seldom at home at the university, he was also at odds with his chosen field, offering a therapeutic approach that allows readers ‘to stop doing philosophy when they want to’ (PI §132). Throughout his work, from the early Tractatus to his ‘Lecture of Ethics’, and again later in his Philosophical Investigations, Wittgenstein drew a boundary between empirical science and philosophy: the latter defined as an investigation of language and the limits of meaning. Starting from a brief biographical sketch of Wittgenstein’s academic life at Cambridge, including his involvement as a student and faculty member in the Moral Sciences Club, we look at how he reconceived the role of philosophy throughout this period of creative antagonism. It is this conflicted relationship we explore, between the revolutionary thinker and his base within an educational institution.

Cambridge and for academic philosophy in particular, it is hard to conceive of him making his significant contributions without considerable support from his academic colleagues, his research fellowship and later teaching career at Cambridge. Paradoxically, although Wittgenstein often showed contempt for the atmosphere at. He also held a chair in the Philosophy Department at Cambridge, and is one of the university’s most recognized even if, as Ray Monk says (1990, 401), ‘reluctant professors’ of philosophy. Ludwig Wittgenstein was a reclusive and enigmatic philosopher, writing his most significant work off campus in remote locations.

Ludwig wittgenstein ray monk