Alfred North Whitehead: A BiographyAlfred North Whitehead: The Man and His Work, Vol. 1, 1861-1910. Victor Lowe

Abstract

Whitehead is primarily known as a philosopher at Harvard who wrote Process and Reality (New York, 1929), thereby originating process theism. But he came to this country in 1924 at the age of sixty-three, already approaching retirement from a full career of teaching mathematics, first at Cambridge and then at London. Most study of Whitehead's work has concentrated on the later American period. This volume fills an important gap by detailing for us Whitehead's life through his time at Cambridge. This biography is clearly a labor of love. Although Whitehead died in 1947, this is the first biography undertaken, and Lowe has meant it to be critical and substantial. He has been working on it since 1965, patiently searching out the evidence and sources he needs, but the quest has proved very frustrating. The materials an ordinary biography relies upon simply are not there. Whitehead was an intensely private person, who directed that all his manuscripts and personal papers be burned at his death. He very rarely wrote letters. Lowe's chief sources concern the institutions Whitehead was associated with (Sherborne, Cambridge, the Apostles), friends of his, especially Bertrand Russell, and the recollections of his children, North and Jessie. Donald W. Sherburne of Vanderbilt University comments (on the dust jacket): have been close to Whitehead's ideas for decades. I now feel much