Highbrow

Ludwig Wittgenstein was an interesting chap and well worth reading, although he only published one book during his lifetime. We could probably describe him as highbrow without too much argument.

The substance of the world can only determine a form and not any material properties. For these are first presented by the propositions—first formed by the configuration of the objects.

Ludwig Wittgenstein - Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (1921)

But suppose we compare him with someone more popular, more accessible and less obviously highbrow. Novelist Edith Wharton for example.

But that was always his way: the least little fragment of fact was enough for him to transform into a palace of dreams, whereas if he tried to grasp more of it at a time it remained on his hands as so much unusable reality.

Edith Wharton - The Gods Arrive (1932)

To my mind Edith Wharton was more broadly astute than Wittgenstein, with wider insights into the human condition. Her novels bring that out even though they are of course fiction. Yet in an important sense there is no such thing as fiction because even fiction is rooted in a language and a reality any reader must understand.

Wittgenstein's ideas tended to be too theoretical for him to bother with certain insights which are there to be grasped by most of us. He refined his thinking too far, pared away too much in a passionate quest for ultimate truth which he never actually achieved. In later years he seemed to gravitate towards viewpoints which were almost mundane and perhaps this too reflects a reality where the human condition is essentially mundane. Easily grasped but easily evaded too - for various reasons.

Popular isn’t necessarily shallow and does not necessarily occupy some lower sphere of human insight. Even now we are too hierarchical in our ideas and our thinking and the drawback of that is obvious. Too many experts go beyond their expertise.

I've lived long enough to doubt whether any real good ever came of sacrificing beautiful facts to even more beautiful theories.
Edith Wharton - The Quicksand (1902)