Suchting, Wallis Arthur (1931-1997) philosopher and university lecturer
Birth: 23 February 1931 at Sherwood, Brisbane, only child of native-born parents William Arthur Suchting (1900-1957) police sergeant, and Dorothy May, née Waller (1901-1975). Marriage: (1) 1952 in Victoria to Marie Leaver. They had one son and one daughter. (2) to Esther Lyons, long-time friend and companion. Death: 12 January 1997 in his home at Ultimo, Sydney. Religion: None - Athiest.
- Grew up in north Queensland. Attended primary schools at Oakey, East Towoomba and Gordonvale before going to Cairns State High School. Won a scholarship to Brisbane Grammar School for the last two years of schooling.
- While in Brisbane he met up with school friend, Ted D’Urso, who introduced Suchting to philosophy which became a life-long interest. While at school he became involved in aestheticism movement and was selected to represent Queesnland in a national colloquium.
- Studied philosophy at the University of Queensland in 1949-1951 (1st Class Hons). While at university he wrote an essay on Dante’s ‘The Divine Comedy’ and won first prize in the Australian Dante Alighieri Society’s competition. Read Dante in Italian which he had taught himself.
- Gained MA at University of Melbourne on ‘The Concept of Necessity in Marx and Engels’, 1952-53. Started PhD in 1954 on ‘The Criterion of Empirical Verifiability of Science’. To assist his study of the subject he learnt Latin, Greek, German, Russian, French and Spanish. This extended his studies beyond the four years of his scholarship funds. Gained worked as a high school history teacher to support himself. Finished PhD in 1961.
- Academic and reader in Philosophy at University of Sydney from 1962. Taught first course on Marxism as philosophy from 1972 and was attended by several hundred students.
- Published books Marx: an Introduction (Harvester, 1983) and Marx and Philosophy (MacMillan, 1986). Published a new English translation of Hegel’s The Encyclopedia of Logic in 1991 with Hackett Publishing Company with a prominent North American scholar. He describes the experience as ‘one of the most miserable periods of my life’ as there were many differences between himself and the co-translator where he felt that he was being repeatedly over-ruled by the prestigious co-translator.
- Retired in 1990 due to being pessimistic about the state of university scholarship, believing that people were pursuing publications irrespective of their quality in their pursuit of the research dollar. In retirement he published a group of four articles to be included in the German Encyclopedia of Marxism and published a series of articles for the journal Science & Education.
Sources
Australian, 19 February 1997; Michael R. Matthews, photo and online obituary: https://www.hpsst.com/uploads/6/2/9/3/62931075/was_obituary__matthews_.pdf
Citation details
'Suchting, Wallis Arthur (1931–1997)', People Australia, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, https://peopleaustralia.anu.edu.au/biography/suchting-wallis-arthur-34840/text43885, accessed 6 November 2024.