The Philosopher and the Shield
Ludwig Wittgenstein visited Skjolden five times. The first and fourth times were the longest stays.
October 17, 1913 to June 1914
August to early September 1921
Three weeks in the summer of 1931
August 1936 to December 1937
October to November 13, 1950
In the autumn of 1913, at the age of 24, Ludwig Wittgenstein left an academic life in Cambridge and went to Norway to have some peace and quiet to work on logic.
The journey ended in Skjolden, at the bottom of the Sognefjord, where factory owner Hallvard Drægni had found a place to stay with his sister, who was married to postmaster Klingenberg.
While Ludwig lived in Skjolden during the winter of 1914, he wrote a philosophical treatise entitled Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921). Ludwig lived in the village until the end of June 1914.
On the mountainside above Eidsvatnet, he has a small house built, which was completed in the fall of 1914. He usually lives in his house when he is in Skjolden.
The last time was in the autumn of 1950, 37 years after the first visit. He writes that he cannot work as well anywhere as in Skjolden.
Growing up and adolescence – 1889-1913
Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) was born as the youngest son into one of the wealthiest families in Austria at the time.
His father has made a name for himself in the steel industry, and they live in a large palace in Vienna. He has seven siblings. Music was always a big and important part of Wittgenstein's life. He teaches himself to play the clarinet, he plays the piano and he is a very skilled whistler.
When Wittgenstein turns 14, he moves to Linz to attend high school.
At the age of 17 he traveled to Berlin to study engineering. He was early fascinated by the art of flying, and at the age of 19 he traveled to Britain and Derbyshire to study aircraft engines and propellers. Then new studies in Manchester before becoming a student of mathematics at Cambridge, at the age of 22. Through Bertrand Russell and Gottlob Frege he became interested in philosophy. In 1912, after a year as a student under Russell, he asked Russell to assess whether he had the ability to become a philosopher. If not, he would quit philosophy and become an aviator. Later he was declared a genius as a philosopher by Russell.
The meeting with Norway – 1913
In September 1913, Ludwig traveled with his Cambridge friend David Hume Pinsent to Øystese in Hardanger on a vacation/work trip. They both had a very positive encounter with Norway, where they were given peace and quiet to work on logic and legal material.
Back in Cambridge early in October, he proclaims to Russell that he will settle in Norway and solve all problems in logic. When Russell says that it will be dark, he replies that he hates daylight. He would rather be lonely than sell his soul by talking to intelligent people. Russell is worried that he will go mad, but then Wittgenstein claims that God will protect him from becoming normal. Wittgenstein is captivated by the silence and nature of Norway, and it suits him well not to have people close to him. He must return to Norway to be able to work in peace.
On a damp and windy day in mid-October 1913, he disembarks in Skjolden. Here he is welcomed by the mayor and industrialist Halvard Johan Thomasson Drægni (1869-1950). Drægni is at this time known as the "Juice King from Sogn". Ludwig has come into contact with Drægni through the Austro-Hungarian consul and merchant Jacob Valentin Kroepelien jr. in Bergen. His sons Bjarne and Trygve Kroepelien are often in Skjolden and Turtagrø to climb the Hurrungane, and Turtagrø Hotell buys both groceries and wine from Kroepelien's company.
Drægni has arranged rooms in the new house next door where Halvard's sister, Sofia Klingenberg (1879-1953), lives with her husband Hans Klingenberg (1874-1938) and daughter Kari (1907-1991). Hans Klingenberg is both director of the ice company (ice for cooling food) and postmaster at Skjolden. Ludwig is given a workroom on the first floor and a bedroom on the second floor, both with a first-class view of the fjord. The time in Norway from October 1913 to the summer of 1914 will be of the most productive kind. The many and warm letters between the family and Ludwig in the years after the first visit testify to close relations. Sofia welcomes Ludwig with open arms and sees him as her own son.
The house in "Austria" - 1914
In 1913, Skjolden was a busy place, among other things as a hub for boat traffic from Bergen and further transport over the Sognefjellet Mountains to Lom.
This first year in Skjolden, and especially the first few months, are very productive for Ludwig. Ludwig has already learned Danish in order to be able to read Søren Kierkegaard in the original language, and he reads "Brand" by Henrik Ibsen before he comes to Norway . Although he speaks English to most people he meets, he learns enough Norwegian this first year to write cards and letters to his friends in Skjolden. He especially appreciates using swear words. Gamle-Galden, a tailor and a good friend, is very religious and wants to convince Ludwig to stop swearing. Ludwig's answer is that Gamle-Galden himself will get great benefit and pleasure from swearing a little more to get the devil out.
At Easter 1914, Ludwig is visited by his friend George Edward Moore, aka GE Moore (1873-1958) from Cambridge. Ludwig meets Moore in Bergen, and together they travel on to Skjolden. A trip from Bergen to Skjolden took between 20-40 hours depending on the mode of travel. Ludwig talks and Moore writes, only interrupted by Afternoon Tea. Moore's notes and regular correspondence with Russell and Keynes become the beginning of the book "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus", often called simply "Tractatus".
The post office in Klingenberg is located in the middle of the city center, which means that Ludwig does not have enough peace and quiet to think in peace. He therefore starts planning his own house in Skjolden. Of three alternative locations, Neshaugane was chosen, later simply called "Österrike" by the locals. He gets help from Halvard Drægni to obtain the best building materials; heartwood from Frønningen. Ludwig is fascinated by the details of the house, and he both plans and draws the house. The house must be of good quality and be useful and functional without decoration or embellishment. When Ludwig thinks the house is expensive, Drægni responds simply and clearly - "you said you wanted the best."
Peace and quiet is important for Ludwig to be able to work, and at one point he asks Halvard Drægni to get him a silent clock that doesn't tick. Drægni thought it didn't exist. In January 1915, a clock arrives from Ludwig to the Halvard Drægni family with glass so thick that you cannot hear a sound.
Arne Drægni
Arne Drægni (1871-1946) is the friend in Skjolden Ludwig says he values most.
He is a younger brother of Halvard, unmarried, a postman and a coachman. In 1912 he bought an old shophouse from Fortun, and he moved it down to Skjolden on the land his father had given him. Arne and Ludwig have many good conversations, both at Arne's house and while walking in the surrounding area. Arne is unlike his brother Halvard in many ways. He has strong opinions about most things. He also doesn't say no to a drink or two, while his brother is a teetotaler. Arne is fearless and stubborn, and doesn't hesitate to travel out with his horse to the edge of the ice to pick up the mail that comes with the coachman. And once the ice breaks under him and his horse, the person who saves the mail bag gets paid twice as much as Arne.
First World War – 1914-1919
Ludwig leaves Skjolden at the end of June 1914, a few months before the house is finished. The plan is to return to Skjolden to live in his new house.
When war breaks out at the end of July 1914, only 10 days pass before he voluntarily enlists for military service for Austria-Hungary. Even though Wittgenstein could have been exempted from the war due to a hernia, it becomes personally important for him to contribute. He even asks to be at the front in order to have new challenges. In 1916 he stops communicating through letters. He reads Tolstoy's short texts on the Gospels, which both changes his outlook on life and saves his life. He finds material wealth a great burden. When he is injured and ends up in a military hospital, he wants to thank the doctor Max Bieler by giving him something; either the house in Skjolden or a Waterman fountain pen. The doctor chooses the pen.
His friend David Pinsent dies as a test pilot during the war, and Wittgenstein grieves deeply. He considers ending his own life, as three of his brothers have done. Later, he himself is taken prisoner in Italy. His family and other powerful friends try to have him released, but he refuses. He will not be free until all the prisoners are free.
He does not want to keep any of his father's inheritance for himself. After the war, he gives away his entire fortune, some to good causes, and the rest he distributes to his brother Paul and his sisters Hermine (1874-1950) and Helene (1879-1956). They are already ruined by too much money. His friend Arne Bolstad inherits the house in Skjolden, which Arne receives information about through a letter to Halvard Drægni in 1919. Ludwig is devastated after the war, and believes that he will never return to Skjolden. He then starts at the teacher training college in Austria.
Return to Skjolden – 1921
In the summer of 1921, Ludwig came to Skjolden on holiday with his family friend Arvid Sjögren. Ludwig was now a poor student teacher, and asked Halvard Drægni for help with transportation from Rotterdam to Bergen and Skjolden.
Drægni is also on the boat from Bergen, but they are no longer traveling in the same class. Drægni nevertheless invites the two men to dinner in first class during the trip. They live in the house in "Austria" during their stay, and visitors are often served tea, biscuits and perhaps an apple. In Skjolden, the two men get jobs at Drægni's juice factory. Because so many locals are unemployed, Drægni comes into conflict with both the trade union and the socialist press because of this. Ludwig and Sjögren probably don't notice this. When they want to manufacture the lids for the berry punches in their own easy but dangerous way, the foreman puts a stop to further production of that type of lid.
After the summer in Skjolden, Ludwig works as a teacher in the Austrian countryside. Later, he works both as a gardener and also as an architect for his sister Margaret Stoneborough-Wittgenstein's (1882-1958) new house in Vienna. After the publication of Tractatus in 1921, Wittgenstein becomes a celebrity in academic circles. However, Wittgenstein changes his attitude towards the book during the 1920s, and feels misunderstood by his environment. In the spring of 1929, he therefore returns to work in Cambridge. A colleague at the University declares to his wife: "Today I saw God. He came on the 3.10 train."
Arne Bolstad – the one who gets the house
Arne Bolstad (1899-1972) became well acquainted with Ludwig during the first visit, and the many letters between them testify to a lifelong friendship.
Getting the house in "Austria" is a large, generous and very unexpected gift, and Arne probably sees himself more as a manager than the owner of the house. Arne probably gets the house mostly because he is the son of the landowner Johannes J. Bolstad (1843-1930). Arne never lives in the house in "Austria" himself, but takes over the house from his parents. He thanks Ludwig in writing for the large gift, and writes that Ludwig must consider the house his own every time he is in Skjolden. Arne is a small farmer, a gardener and he plays both the violin and the saw well. He never marries, even though others try to marry him off to suitable women.
When Ludwig lives in the house, Arne is allowed to visit. The agreement is that he will quietly sit on a chair just inside the front door and wait until he is spoken to. This way, Ludwig can work in peace and be social when he is ready. Some Skjolden residents see Ludwig as a misogynist; he rarely talks to women, he never discusses philosophy with women and it can seem that he wants nothing to do with women at all. It is therefore particularly surprising when he decides to take Marguerite with him to Skjolden for a few weeks in the summer of 1931.
Girlfriend Marguerite and the summer in Skjolden – 1931
It is hard for Wittgenstein to leave Vienna and his Swiss sweetheart Marguerite Respinger (1904-2000) for a job at Cambridge in 1929.
He misses her dearly, and wants with all his heart to fall in love with her. Ludwig still has the hope of marrying Marguerite in the summer of 1931, and invites her to Skjolden with him on vacation. Some sources say that they were engaged, others that he was only considering it. Marguerite lives with Anna Rebni and the hotel at Eide gard while Ludwig lives in the house, a bit alone and a week together with his close friend from Cambridge, Gilbert Pattison. For Ludwig, it is important that Marguerite and he spend their time in Skjolden separately, even though they are planning a future together.
During the two weeks Marguerite is in Skjolden, she sees little of Ludwig. She likes to bathe in the waterfall near "Austria" to get Ludwig interested and perhaps a little jealous, but without success. The relationship ends after the summer when she travels straight from Skjolden to her sister's wedding in Rome. She later marries Talle Sjögren, Arvid Sjögren's brother. An hour before the wedding on New Year's Eve 1933, Wittgenstein comes to Marguerite and asks her to marry him instead. Marguerite refuses the offer.
Anna Rebni
Although Ludwig seeks out Skjolden for peace and quiet, he also has a strong and genuine need for human contact and companionship.
But he does not want to surround himself with just anyone, and he prefers to surround himself with people from the slightly higher social classes in the village. Anna Rebni (1869-1971) takes over as manager of Eide farm in 1925, and she becomes a close friend and conversation partner for Ludwig as long as he lives. She is one of the few women Ludwig wants to have conversations and discussions with. From his house he can look over to Eide, and he often drops by her.
Anna is a trained teacher, speaks several languages and works as a teacher in Oslo until 1920. She is a tough, strong older woman who has suffered a lot throughout her life. Like Ludwig, she is special and unwilling to kill animals.
Anna manages both the farm and the accommodation business "Hotellet", and she can be busy. Ludwig really dislikes it if she doesn't prioritize him first when he stops by. He can also be provoked by her. Ludwig doesn't like the old and rusty water jug she has by her water barrel, and he gets her a new one.
When Anna nevertheless continues to use the old one, he becomes angry and takes it out into the yard to throw it as far away as he can. They maintain close contact via letters while Ludwig is away from Skjolden, and the letters are marked by warm care and close friendship.
Skjolden 1936-1937 – the longest stay
In August 1936, Ludwig left his close friend Francis Skinner in Cambridge to live and work in the house by Eidsvatnet.
Here he remains until December 1937, interrupted only by short trips to his homeland and Cambridge. He writes a close and personal diary in coded script during this time. The writing is a long and hard process with manuscripts full of crossing outs, underlinings, insertions and numerous text variants. He gets a lot of work done here and writes a quarter of "Philosophical Investigations". This was the only work on the book that he felt completely satisfied with and did not need to make any changes to.
At the same time, he struggles with his own thoughts about himself, both anxiety and self-loathing, and he is ambivalent about living. In response to a letter from Moore in the autumn of 1936, he writes that although it is cold, it is drier and warmer than in England, and that he cannot imagine that he could have worked anywhere as he does in Skjolden. He states that he had it “more than really well here!” But he misses Skinner and being close to other people.
Francis Skinner (1912-1941) is a mathematics student inspired by Wittgenstein, and he becomes uncritically and totally attached to him.
Skinner earned a degree in mathematics from Trinity College, Cambridge, and then worked with Wittgenstein. They had both a professional and a sexual relationship. Skinner took notes while Wittgenstein dictated, but he also actively participated in the drafting of the text "The Pink Book". Skinner was born with osteoporosis. He contracted polio and died during World War II. This took a toll on Wittgenstein, who had kept him a little more at a distance in the last years of his life. Only when time passed and Wittgenstein gained distance did he clearly see who was important in his life. The men that Ludwig found attractive were often handsome, intelligent, humble, sensitive, and not overbearing. In addition to Skinner, he was attracted to David Hume Pinsent and Ben Richards (and perhaps more?).
The locals call him "the Austrian", and he is often seen walking back and forth on the balcony high above the lake. Ludwig uses a kerosene lamp, and he turns off the lights early every evening. He has his own credit account in Drægni's shop and a private agreement for the delivery of goods every Saturday. Nevertheless, he often travels down to the village himself to shop. He is the first to cross Eidsvatnet on skis in the fall, usually just a few days after the ice sets in. Otherwise, he usually gets to Skjolden by rowing across the water in his boat, and when the river is low he can wade across and cycle. He usually visits Anna Rebni, Arne Drægni, Jon Galde or Arne Bolstad.
The mountainside is too steep to walk around, and Ludwig usually has a good idea of who is coming. But once a local farmer passes the house on his way up to check on his animals at Hjerseggi, Ludwig comes running out. He shouts that the farmer has disturbed his work and that it will take 14 days before he regains the thought he had before the farmer came. That someone can think of thinking as work appears quite far from the everyday life of the locals. But since he has powerful friends in Skjolden, he gains respect from the villagers. This despite the fact that he is seen as an oddity. He can have long conversations with a grazing cow, and sometimes he walks right past people without saying hello. The longest stay in Skjolden ends on December 12, 1937.
Skjolden 1950 – the last meeting
Together with his close friend Ben Richards, he is in Skjolden for five weeks in October-November 1950. The house in "Österrike" had been a gathering point for the locals during the war, and they start the visit by removing Arne Bolstad's flags, resistance posters and the like from the walls.
Hallvard Drægni dies in October, and Ludwig most likely attended the funeral. For the first few weeks they live in the house in "Austria", but it is cold there and Richards falls ill.
After Richards had to visit the doctor's office in Luster for a second time with bronchitis, they moved in with Anna at Eide Gard. Ludwig gave Richards "Brand" as reading material during his stay in hospital, district doctor J. Devold later recalled.
Ludwig himself is seriously ill during this last stay. In November 1949 he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He writes a letter to Malcolm that "Skjolden is the only place I know of where I can find real peace."
After the very last departure from Skjolden on November 13, 1950, he tries to organize a new trip back already in January. Keeping a large house open in January requires a lot of work and energy for heating. Anna is now over 80 years old, with poor bones, Ludwig is seriously ill and Anna asks him to come back in the spring. Arne Bolstad writes that he can get him another house to live in for the winter, but Ludwig has to keep postponing the trip because he is not in good enough shape.
Ludwig Wittgenstein dies in Cambridge on April 29, 1951.