Bertrand Arthur William Russell, 3rd Earl Russell,
OM,
FRS (18 May 1872 – 2 February
1970) was a British
philosopher,
logician,
mathematician,
historian,
socialist,
pacifist and
social theorist.
Although he spent the
majority of his life in England
, he was born
in Wales
, where he
also died.
Russell led the British "revolt against
idealism" in the early 1900s. He is considered one
of the founders of
analytic
philosophy along with his protégé
Wittgenstein and his elder
Frege, and is widely held to be one of the
20th century's premier logicians. He co-authored, with
A. N.
Whitehead,
Principia Mathematica, an attempt
to ground mathematics on logic. His philosophical essay "
On Denoting" has been considered a "paradigm of
philosophy." Both works have had a considerable influence on
logic,
mathematics,
set theory,
linguistics, and philosophy.
He was a prominent
anti-war activist, championing
free
trade between nations and
anti-imperialism.
Russell was imprisoned
for his pacifist activism during World War I, campaigned against
Adolf Hitler, for nuclear disarmament, criticised Soviet
totalitarianism and the United States of
America
's involvement in the Vietnam
War.
In 1950, Russell was awarded the
Nobel Prize in Literature, "in
recognition of his varied and significant writings in which he
champions
humanitarian ideals and
freedom of thought."
Biography
Ancestry
Bertrand
Russell was born on 18 May 1872 at Cleddon Hall, Trellech
, Monmouthshire
, into a liberal family of the English
aristocracy.
His paternal grandfather,
John Russell, 1st Earl
Russell, was the third son of
John Russell, 6th Duke of
Bedford, and had twice been asked by
Queen Victoria to form a government, serving
her as
Prime Minister in the 1840s
and 1860s.
The Russells had been prominent in England for several centuries
before this, coming to power and the peerage with the rise of the
Tudor dynasty. They established
themselves as one of Britain's leading
Whig (Liberal) families, and participated
in every great political event from the
Dissolution of the
Monasteries in 1536–40 to the
Glorious Revolution in 1688–89 to the
Great Reform Act in 1832.
Russell's mother Katherine Louisa (1844–1874) was the daughter of
Edward
Stanley, 2nd Baron Stanley of Alderley, and was the sister of
Rosalind Howard, Countess of
Carlisle.
Russell's parents were radical for their times. Russell's father,
Viscount Amberley,
was an
atheist and consented to his wife's
affair with their children's tutor, the biologist
Douglas Spalding. Both were early advocates
of
birth control at a time when this
was considered scandalous. John Russell's atheism was evident when
he asked the philosopher
John Stuart
Mill to act as Russell's secular
godfather. Mill died the year after Russell's
birth, but his writings had a great effect on Russell's life.
Childhood and adolescence
Russell had two siblings:
Frank (nearly seven years
older than Bertrand), and Rachel (four years older). In June 1874
Russell's mother died of
diphtheria,
followed shortly by Rachel, and in January 1876 his father also
died of
bronchitis following a long
period of
depression.
Frank and
Bertrand were placed in the care of their staunchly Victorian grandparents, who lived at
Pembroke
Lodge
in Richmond
Park
. John Russell, 1st Earl
Russell, his grandfather, died in 1878, and was remembered by
Russell as a kindly old man in a wheelchair. As a result, his
widow, the Countess Russell (née Lady Frances Elliot), was the
dominant family figure for the rest of Russell's childhood and
youth.
The
countess was from a Scottish
Presbyterian family, and successfully
petitioned a British court to set aside a
provision in Amberley's will requiring
the children to be raised as agnostics. Despite her religious
conservatism, she held progressive views in other areas (accepting
Darwinism and supporting
Irish Home Rule), and her influence on Bertrand
Russell's outlook on
social justice
and standing up for principle remained with him throughout his
life — her favourite Bible verse, 'Thou shalt not follow a
multitude to do evil' (
Exodus 23:2),
became his mantra. The atmosphere at Pembroke Lodge was one of
frequent prayer, emotional repression and formality; Frank reacted
to this with open rebellion, but the young Bertrand learned to hide
his feelings.
Russell's
adolescence was very lonely,
and he often contemplated
suicide. He
remarked in his autobiography that his keenest interests were in
sex, religion and mathematics, and that only the wish to know more
mathematics kept him from suicide. He was educated at home by a
series of tutors.
His brother Frank introduced him to the work of
Euclid, which transformed Russell's life.
Also, during these formative years, he discovered the works of
Percy Bysshe Shelley. In his
Autobiography, he writes that, "I spent all my spare time reading
him, and learning him by heart, knowing no one to whom I could
speak of what I thought or felt, I used to reflect how wonderful it
would have been to know Shelley, and to wonder whether I should
meet any live human being with whom I should feel so much
sympathy."
University and first marriage
Russell
won a scholarship to read for the Mathematical Tripos at Trinity
College, Cambridge
, and commenced his studies there in 1890. He
became acquainted with the younger
G.E. Moore and came under the influence of
Alfred North Whitehead, who
recommended him to the
Cambridge
Apostles. He quickly distinguished himself in mathematics and
philosophy, graduating with a B.A. in the former subject in 1893
and adding a fellowship in the latter in 1895.
Russell first met the American
Quaker Alys Pearsall Smith when he was
seventeen years old.
He became a friend of the Pearsall Smith
family—they knew him primarily as 'Lord John's grandson' and
enjoyed showing him off—and travelled with them to the continent;
it was in their company that Russell visited the Paris Exhibition of 1889 and was
able to climb the Eiffel
Tower
soon after it was completed.
He soon
fell in love with the puritanical, high-minded Alys, who was a
graduate of Bryn Mawr
College
near Philadelphia
, and, contrary to his grandmother's wishes, he
married her on 13 December 1894. Their
marriage began to fall apart in 1901 when it
occurred to Russell, while he was out on his bicycle, that he no
longer loved her. She asked him if he loved her and he replied that
he didn't. Russell also disliked Alys's mother, finding her
controlling and cruel. It was to be a hollow shell of a marriage
and they finally divorced in 1921, after a lengthy period of
separation.During this period, Russell had passionate (and often
simultaneous) affairs with a number of women, including Lady
Ottoline Morrell and the actress
Lady
Constance Malleson.
Early career
Russell
began his published work in 1896 with German
Social Democracy, a study in politics
that was an early indication of a lifelong interest in political
and social theory. In 1896, he taught German social democracy
at the London
School of Economics
, where he also lectured on the science of power in
the autumn of 1937. He was also a member of the
Coefficients dining club of
social reformers set up in 1902 by the
Fabian campaigners
Sidney and
Beatrice
Webb.
Russell in 1907
In 1905 he wrote the essay "
On
Denoting", which was published in the philosophical journal
Mind. Russell became a
fellow of the
Royal Society in 1908.
The first of three volumes of
Principia Mathematica, written
with Whitehead, was published in 1910, which, along with the
earlier
The Principles of Mathematics, soon
made Russell world famous in his field. In 1911, he became
acquainted with the Austrian engineering student
Ludwig Wittgenstein, whom he viewed as a
genius and a successor who would continue his work on logic. He
spent hours dealing with Wittgenstein's various phobias and his
frequent bouts of despair. This was often a drain on Russell's
energy, but Russell continued to be fascinated by him and
encouraged his
academic development,
including the publication of Wittgenstein's
Tractatus
Logico-Philosophicus in 1922.
First World War
During
the First World War, Russell was one of
a very small number of intellectuals engaged in pacifist activities, and, in 1916,
he was dismissed from Trinity College following his conviction under the Defence of the Realm Act.
A later
conviction resulted in six months' imprisonment in Brixton
prison
(see Bertrand Russell's views on
society). Russell was released from prison in
September 1918.
Between the wars, and second marriage
In August
1920, Russell traveled to Russia
as part of
an official delegation sent by the British government to
investigate the effects of the Russian Revolution. He met
Lenin and had an hour-long conversation with
him. In his autobiography, he mentions that he found Lenin rather
disappointing, and that he sensed an "impish cruelty" in him. He
also cruised down the Volga on a steam-ship. Russell's lover
Dora Black also visited Russia
independently at the same time — she was enthusiastic about
the revolution, but Russell's experiences destroyed his previous
tentative support for it.
Russell subsequently lectured in
Beijing on
philosophy for one year, accompanied by Dora. He went there with
optimism and hope as China was then on a new path, among other
scholars was Rabindranath Tagore, the Indian poet and also a Nobel
Laureate. While in China, Russell became gravely ill with
pneumonia, and
incorrect reports of his death
were published in the Japanese press.
When the couple
visited Japan
on their
return journey, Dora notified the world that "Mr. Bertrand Russell,
having died according to the Japanese press, is unable to give
interviews to Japanese journalists." The press were not
amused and did not appreciate the sarcasm.
On the couple's return to England on 26 August 1921, Dora was six
months pregnant, and Russell arranged a hasty divorce from Alys,
marrying Dora six days after the divorce was finalised, on 27
September 1921. Their children were
John Conrad Russell, 4th
Earl Russell, born on 16 November 1921 and
Katharine Jane Russell (now Lady Katharine
Tait) born on 29 December 1923. Russell supported himself during
this time by writing popular books explaining matters of
physics,
ethics, and
education to the
layman.
Some have suggested that at this point he had an affair with
Vivienne Haigh-Wood, first wife
of
T. S.
Eliot.
Together with Dora, he also founded the experimental Beacon Hill
School in 1927.
The school was run from a succession of
different locations, including its original premises at the
Russell's residence, Telegraph House, near Harting
, West
Sussex
. After he left the school in 1932, Dora
continued it until 1943.
Upon the death of his elder brother Frank, in 1931, Russell became
the 3rd Earl Russell. He once said that his
title was primarily useful for securing
hotel rooms.
Russell's marriage to Dora grew increasingly tenuous, and it
reached a breaking point over her having two children with an
American
journalist, Griffin Barry. They
separated in 1932 and finally divorced.
On 18 January 1936,
Russell married his third wife, an Oxford
undergraduate named Patricia Spence, who had been
his children's governess since the summer
of 1930. Russell and Peter had one son,
Conrad Sebastian Robert
Russell, 5th Earl Russell, who became a prominent historian and
one of the leading figures in the
Liberal Democrat party.
Second World War
After the
Second World War, Russell taught at the
University
of Chicago
, later moving on to Los
Angeles
to lecture at the University of California, Los
Angeles. He was appointed professor at the City College
of New York
in 1940, but after a public outcry, the appointment
was annulled by a court judgement: his opinions (especially those
relating to sexual morality,
detailed in Marriage and
Morals ten years earlier) made him "morally unfit" to
teach at the college. The protest was started by the mother
of a student who would not have been eligible for his
graduate-level course in mathematical logic. Many intellectuals,
led by
John Dewey, protested against his
treatment.
Albert Einstein's
often-quoted aphorism that "Great spirits have always encountered
violent opposition from mediocre minds..." originated in his open
letter in support of Russell, during this time. Dewey and
Horace M. Kallen edited a collection of articles on
the CCNY affair in
The
Bertrand Russell Case.
He soon joined the Barnes
Foundation
, lecturing to a varied audience on the history of
philosophy; these lectures formed the basis of History of Western
Philosophy. His relationship with the eccentric
Albert C. Barnes soon soured, and he returned to
Britain in 1944 to rejoin the faculty of Trinity College.
Later life
During the 1940s and 1950s, Russell participated in many broadcasts
over the
BBC, particularly the
Third Programme, on various topical and
philosophical subjects. By this time Russell was world famous
outside of academic circles, frequently the subject or author of
magazine and newspaper articles, and was called upon to offer up
opinions on a wide variety of subjects, even mundane ones.
En route
to one of his lectures in Trondheim
, Russell was one of 24 survivors (among a total of
43 passengers) in a aeroplane
crash in Hommelvik in October 1948. History of Western
Philosophy (1945) became a best-seller, and provided
Russell with a steady income for the remainder of his life.
In a speech in 1948 Russell said that if the USSR's aggression
continued, it would be morally worse to go to war after the USSR
possessed an atomic bomb than before they possessed one, because if
the USSR had no bomb the West's victory would come more swiftly and
with fewer casualties than if there were atom bombs on both sides.
At that time, only the USA possessed an atomic bomb, and the USSR
was pursuing an extremely aggressive policy towards the countries
in
Eastern Europe which it was
absorbing into its
sphere of
influence. Many understood Russell's comments to mean that
Russell approved of a
first strike in a
war with the USSR, including Lawson, who was present when Russell
spoke. Others, including Griffin who obtained a transcript of the
speech, have argued that he was merely explaining the usefulness of
America's atomic arsenal in deterring the USSR from continuing its
domination of Eastern Europe.
In the
King's Birthday
Honours of 9 June 1949, Russell was awarded the
Order of Merit, and the
following year he was awarded the
Nobel Prize in Literature. When he
was given the Order of Merit,
King George
VI was affable but slightly embarrassed at decorating a former
jailbird, saying that "You have sometimes
behaved in a manner that would not do if generally adopted."
Russell merely smiled, but afterwards claimed that the reply
"That's right, just like your
brother" immediately came
to mind.
In 1952, Russell was divorced by Peter, with whom he had been very
unhappy. Conrad, Russell's son by Peter, did not see his father
between the time of the divorce and 1968 (at which time his
decision to meet his father caused a permanent breach with his
mother).
Russell married his fourth wife,
Edith Finch, soon after the divorce, on
15 December 1952.
They had known each other since 1925, and
Edith had taught English at
Bryn Mawr
College near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
, sharing a house for twenty years with Russell's
old friend Lucy Donnelly. Edith remained with him until his
death, and, by all accounts, their marriage was a happy, close, and
loving one. Russell's eldest son, John, suffered from serious
mental illness, which was the source
of ongoing disputes between Russell and John's mother, Russell's
former wife, Dora. John's wife Susan was also mentally ill, and
eventually Russell and Edith became the legal guardians of their
three daughters (two of whom were later found to have
schizophrenia).
Political causes
Russell spent the 1950s and 1960s engaged in various political
causes, primarily related to nuclear disarmament and opposing the
Vietnam war (see also
Russell Vietnam War Crimes Tribunal). The
1955
Russell-Einstein
Manifesto was a document calling for nuclear disarmament and
was signed by 11 of the prominent nuclear physicists and
intellectuals of the time. He wrote a great many letters to world
leaders during this period. He was in contact with
Lionel Rogosin while the latter was filming
his anti-war film
Good Times, Wonderful Times in the
1960s. He also became a hero to many of the youthful members of the
New Left. During the 1960s, in particular,
Russell became increasingly vocal about his disapproval of what he
felt to be the USA government's near-genocidal policies. In 1963 he
became the inaugural recipient of the
Jerusalem Prize, an award for writers
concerned with the freedom of the individual in society. In October
1965 he tore up his
Labour Party
card because he feared the party was going to send soldiers to
support the USA in the Vietnam War.
Final years and death
Russell published his three-volume autobiography in 1967, 1968, and
1969.
On
23 November 1969 he wrote to The
Times newspaper saying that the preparation for show
trials in Czechoslovakia
was "highly alarming". The same month he
appealed to Secretary General
U Thant of the
United Nations to support an
international war crimes commission to investigate alleged torture
and genocide by the USA in South Vietnam. The following month, he
protested to
Alexei Kosygin over the
expulsion of
Aleksandr
Solzhenitsyn from the Writers Union.
On 31 January 1970, Russell issued a statement which condemned
Israeli aggression in the
Middle East
and called for Israeli withdrawal from territory occupied in 1967.
The statement said that: This was Russell's final political
statement or act.
It was read out at the International
Conference of Parliamentarians in Cairo
on 3
February 1970, the day after his death.
Russell
died of influenza on 2 February 1970 at
his home, Plas Penrhyn, in Penrhyndeudraeth, Merionethshire
, Wales.
He was
cremated in Colwyn
Bay
on 5 February 1970. In accordance with his
will there was no religious ceremony; his ashes were scattered over
the Welsh mountains later that year.
Self-assessment and summary of his own life
At the age of 84, Russell added a five-paragraph prologue to a new
publication of his autobiography, giving a summary of the work and
his life, titled
WHAT I HAVE LIVED FOR.
Three passions, simple but
overwhelmingly strong, have governed my life: the longing for love,
the search for knowledge, and unbearable pity for the suffering of
mankind.
These passions, like great winds,
have blown me hither and thither, in a wayward course, over a deep
ocean of anguish, reaching to the very verge of
despair.
I have sought love, first, because it brings ecstasy—ecstasy so
great that I would often have sacrificed all the rest of life for a
few hours of this joy.
I have sought it, next, because
it relieves loneliness—that terrible loneliness in which one
shivering consciousness looks over the rim of the world into the
cold unfathomable lifeless abyss.
I have sought it, finally,
because in the union of love I have seen, in a mystic miniature,
the prefiguring vision of the heaven that saints and poets have
imagined.
This is what I sought, and though
it might seem too good for human life, this is what—at last—I have
found.
With equal passion I have sought knowledge.
I have wished to understand the
hearts of men.
I have wished to know why the
stars shine.
And I have tried to apprehend the
Pythagorean power by which number holds sway above the
flux.
A little of this, but not much, I
have achieved.
Love and knowledge, so far as they were possible, led upward toward
the heavens.
But always pity brought me back
to earth.
Echoes of cries of pain
reverberate in my heart.
Children in famine, victims
tortured by oppressors, helpless old people a hated burden to their
sons, and the whole world of loneliness, poverty, and pain make a
mockery of what human life should be.
I long to alleviate the evil, but
I cannot, and I too suffer.
This has been my life.
I have found it worth living, and
would gladly live it again if the chance were offered
me.
Titles and honours from birth
Russell held throughout his life the following styles and honours:
- from birth until 1908: The Honourable Bertrand Arthur William
Russell
- from 1908 until 1931: The Honourable Bertrand Arthur William
Russell, FRS
- from 1931 until 1949: The Right Honourable The Earl Russell,
FRS
- from 1949 until death: The Right Honourable The Earl Russell,
OM, FRS
Views
Views on philosophy
Russell is generally credited with being one of the founders of
analytic philosophy. He was
deeply impressed by
Gottfried
Leibniz (
1646-
1716) and
wrote on every major area of philosophy except aesthetics. He was
particularly prolific in the field of
metaphysics, the
logic and the philosophy of mathematics, the
philosophy
of language,
ethics and
epistemology.
When
Brand Blanshard asked Russell
why he didn't write on aesthetics, Russell replied that he didn't
know anything about it, "but that is not a very good excuse, for my
friends tell me it has not deterred me from writing on other
subjects."
Views on society
Political and social
activism occupied much
of Russell's time for most of his life, which makes his prodigious
and seminal writing on a wide range of technical and non-technical
subjects all the more remarkable. Russell remained politically
active almost to the end of his life, writing to and exhorting
world leaders and lending his name to various causes.
Further reading
Selected bibliography of Russell's books
This is a selected bibliography of Russell's books in English
sorted by year of first publication.
- 1896, German Social Democracy, London: Longmans,
Green.
- 1897, An Essay on the Foundations of Geometry,
Cambridge: At the University Press.
- 1900, A Critical Exposition of the Philosophy of
Leibniz, Cambridge: At the University Press.
- 1903, The Principles
of Mathematics The Principles of Mathematics,
Cambridge: At the University Press.
- 1905 On Denoting, Mind vol.
14, NS, ISSN: 00264425, Basil Blackwell
- 1910, Philosophical Essays, London: Longmans,
Green.
- 1910–1913, Principia
Mathematica (with Alfred
North Whitehead), 3 vols., Cambridge: At the University
Press.
- 1912, The Problems of
Philosophy, London: Williams and Norgate.
- 1914, Our Knowledge of the External World as a Field for
Scientific Method in Philosophy, Chicago and London: Open
CPublishing.
- 1916, Principles of Social Reconstruction, London:
George Allen & Unwin.
- 1916, Justice in War-time, Chicago: Open Court.
- 1917, Political Ideals, New York: The Century
Co.
- 1918, Mysticism and Logic and Other Essays, London:
Longmans, Green.
- 1918, Proposed Roads to Freedom: Socialism, Anarchism, and
Syndicalism, London: George Allen & Unwin.
- 1919, Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy,
London: George Allen & Unwin, (ISBN 0-415-09604-9 for Routledge
paperback) ( Copy at Archive.org).
- 1920, The Practice and Theory of Bolshevism,London:
George Allen & Unwin
- 1921, The Analysis of Mind, London: George Allen
& Unwin.
- 1922, The Problem of China, London: George Allen
& Unwin.
- 1923, The Prospects of Industrial Civilization (in
collaboration with Dora Russell), London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1923, The ABC of Atoms, London: Kegan Paul, Trench,
Trubner.
- 1924, Icarus, or the Future of Science, London: Kegan
Paul, Trench, Trubner.
- 1925, The ABC of Relativity, London: Kegan Paul,
Trench, Trubner.
- 1925, What I Believe,
London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner.
- 1926, On Education, Especially in Early Childhood,
London: George Allen & Unwin.
- 1927, The Analysis of Matter, London: Kegan Paul,
Trench, Trubner.
- 1927, An Outline of Philosophy, London: George Allen
& Unwin.
- 1927, Why I Am Not a
Christian, London: Watts.
- 1927, Selected Papers of Bertrand Russell, New York:
Modern Library.
- 1928, Sceptical Essays, London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1929, Marriage and
Morals, London: George Allen & Unwin.
- 1930, The Conquest of Happiness, London: George Allen
& Unwin.
- 1931, The Scientific Outlook, London: George Allen
& Unwin.
- 1932, Education and the Social Order, London: George
Allen & Unwin.
- 1934, Freedom and Organization, 1814–1914, London:
George Allen & Unwin.
- 1935, In Praise of Idleness, London: George Allen
& Unwin.
- 1935, Religion and Science, London: Thornton
Butterworth.
- 1936, Which Way to Peace?, London: Jonathan Cape.
- 1937, The Amberley Papers: The Letters and Diaries of Lord
and Lady Amberley (with Patricia Russell), 2 vols., London:
Leonard & Virginia Woolf at the Hogarth Press.
- 1938, Power: A New
Social Analysis, London: George Allen & Unwin.
- 1940, An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth, New York: W.
W. Norton & Company.
- 1945, History of Western
Philosophy and Its Connection with Political and Social
Circumstances from the Earliest Times to the Present Day,
New York: Simon and Schuster.
- 1948, Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits, London:
George Allen & Unwin.
- 1949, Authority and the Individual, London: George
Allen & Unwin.
- 1950, Unpopular Essays, London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1951, New Hopes for a Changing World, London: George
Allen & Unwin.
- 1952, The Impact of Science on Society, London: George
Allen & Unwin.
- 1953, Satan in the Suburbs and Other Stories, London:
George Allen & Unwin.
- 1954, Human Society in Ethics and Politics, London:
George Allen & Unwin.
- 1954, Nightmares of Eminent Persons and Other Stories,
London: George Allen & Unwin.
- 1956, Portraits from Memory and Other Essays, London:
George Allen & Unwin.
- 1956, Logic and Knowledge: Essays 1901–1950 (edited by
Robert C. Marsh), London: George Allen & Unwin.
- 1957, Why I Am Not A Christian and Other Essays on Religion
and Related Subjects (edited by Paul Edwards), London: George
Allen & Unwin.
- 1958, Understanding History and Other Essays, New
York: Philosophical Library.
- 1959, Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare, London: George
Allen & Unwin.
- 1959, My
Philosophical Development, London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1959, Wisdom of the West ("editor", Paul Foulkes),
London: Macdonald.
- 1960, Bertrand Russell Speaks His Mind, Cleveland and
New York: World Publishing Company.
- 1961, The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell (edited
by R.E. Egner and L.E. Denonn), London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1961, Fact and Fiction, London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1961, Has Man a Future?, London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1963, Essays in Skepticism, New York: Philosophical
Library.
- 1963, Unarmed Victory, London: George Allen &
Unwin.
- 1965, On the Philosophy of Science (edited by Charles
A. Fritz, Jr.), Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Company.
- 1967, Russell's Peace Appeals (edited by Tsutomu
Makino and Kazuteru Hitaka), Japan: Eichosha's New Current
Books.
- 1967, War Crimes in Vietnam, London: George Allen
& Unwin.
- 1967–1969, The Autobiography of Bertrand Russell, 3
vols., London: George Allen & Unwin.
- 1969, Dear Bertrand Russell... A Selection of his
Correspondence with the General Public 1950–1968 (edited by
Barry Feinberg and Ronald Kasrils), London: George Allen and
Unwin.
Note: This is a mere sampling, for Russell also wrote many
pamphlets, introductions, articles and letters to the editor.
His works
also can be found in any number of anthologies and collections,
perhaps most notably The Collected Papers of Bertrand
Russell, which McMaster University
began publishing in 1983. This collection of
his shorter and previously unpublished works is now up to 16
volumes, and many more are forthcoming. An additional three volumes
catalogue just his bibliography.
The Russell Archives at McMaster
University also have more than 30,000 letters that he
wrote.
Additional references
Russell
- 1900, Sur la logique des relations avec des applications à
la théorie des séries, Rivista di matematica 7:
115-148.
- 1901, On the Notion of Order, Mind (n.s.) 10:
35-51.
- 1902, (with Alfred North
Whitehead), On Cardinal Numbers, American Journal
of Mathematics 23: 367-384.
Secondary references
- John Newsome Crossley. A Note on Cantor's Theorem and
Russell's Paradox, Australian Journal of Philosophy
51: 70-71.
- Ivor Grattan-Guinness,
2000. The Search for Mathematical Roots 1870-1940.
Princeton University Press.
Books about Russell's philosophy
- Bertrand Russell: Critical Assessments, edited by A.
D. Irvine, 4 volumes, London: Routledge, 1999. Consists of essays
on Russell's work by many distinguished philosophers.
- Bertrand Russell, by John Slater, Bristol: Thoemmes
Press, 1994.
- Bertrand Russell's Ethics. by Michael K. Potter,
Bristol: Thoemmes Continuum, 2006. A clear and accessible
explanation of Russell's moral philosophy.
- The Philosophy of Bertrand Russell, edited by P.A.
Schilpp, Evanston and Chicago: Northwestern University, 1944.
- Russell, by A. J. Ayer, London: Fontana, 1972. ISBN
0-00-632965-9. A lucid summary exposition of Russell's
thought.
- The Lost Cause: Causation and the Mind-Body Problem,
by Celia Green. Oxford: Oxford Forum,
2003. ISBN 0-9536772-1-4 Contains a sympathetic analysis of
Russell's views on causality.
- Russell's Idealist Apprenticeship, by Nicholas
Griffin. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991.
Biographical books
- Bertrand Russell: Philosopher and Humanist, by
John Lewis (1968)
- Bertrand Russell, by A.
J. Ayer (1972),
reprint ed. 1988: ISBN 0-226-03343-0
- The Life of
Bertrand Russell, by Ronald
W. Clark (1975) ISBN
0-394-49059-2
- Bertrand Russell and His World, by Ronald W. Clark
(1981) ISBN 0-500-13070-1
- Bertrand Russell: Mathematics: Dreams and Nightmares
by Ray Monk (1997) ISBN 0-75380-190-6
- Bertrand Russell: 1872–1920 The Spirit of Solitude by
Ray Monk (1997) ISBN 0-09-973131-2
- Bertrand Russell: 1921–1970 The Ghost of Madness by
Ray Monk (2001) ISBN 0-09-927275-X
Notes
References
- Bertrand Russell. 1967–1969, The Autobiography of Bertrand
Russell, 3 volumes, London: George Allen & Unwin.
- Wallechinsky, David & Irving Wallace. 1975-1981, "Famous
Marriages Bertrand Russell & Alla Pearsall Smith, Part 1" &
"Part 3", on "Alys" Pearsall Smith, webpage content from The
People's Almanac, webpages: Part 1 & Part 3 (accessed 2008-11-08).
- Russell B, (1944) "My Mental Development", in Schilpp, Paul
Arturn "The Philosophy of Betrand Russell", New York, Tudorm 1951,
pp 3–20
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