BLS Nelson outlines four types of philosophers: programmists, informalists, lone wolves, and syncretists. The lone wolf, who "will often appear as a kind of contrarian with a distinctive personality," is exemplified by Wittgenstein:
Ludwig Wittgenstein was a lone wolf, in the sense that nobody could quite refute Wittgenstein except for Wittgenstein. The philosophical monograph which made him famous, the Tractatus, began with an admission of idiosyncracy: “Perhaps this book will be understood only by someone who has himself already had the thoughts that are expressed in it—or at least similar thoughts.—So it is not a textbook.—Its purpose would be achieved if it gave pleasure to one person who read and understood it.” He was a private man, who published very little while alive, and whose positions were sometimes unclear even to his students. He was an intense man, reputed to have wielded a hot poker at one of his contemporaries. And he had an oracular style of writing — the Tractatus resembles an overlong Powerpoint presentation, while the Investigations was a free-wheeling screed. These qualities conspired to give the man himself an almost mythical quality. As Ernest Nagel wrote in 1936 (quoting a Viennese friend): “in certain circles the existence of Wittgenstein is debated with as much ingenuity as the historicity of Christ has been disputed in others”.
Recent Dish on Wittgenstein's photography here.
