The Works of Ayn Rand

[Deleted]

A few years ago, I read Atlas Shrugged, mostly because I wanted to be able to debate with the Randites with actual knowledge. Ugh. That was painful.

Now, I've decided to give The Fountainhead a read. I'm trying to keep an open mind, but I'm scared I'll turn into a raving Objectionist who quotes her at every turn.

[Maddiemoo]

All I know is that college freshman read her books in an attempt to look intelligent. Since I myself am a college freshman, I am attempting to avoid her books to keep myself out of that cliche.

[Deleted]

I've tried reading Atlas Shrugged thrice now and I just cannot get through the damn thing. That's my entire Ayn Rand experience so far.

[poodle]

I have a strange relationship with Ayn Rand. I hate her and her philosophy with a passion, but I quite like her books. I've read all of them at least twice and they're books I'll consistently take off my bookshelves when there's nothing else around to read.

Makes me very very confused.

Though, I must admit that hating Ayn Rand and everything she stands for is now a requirement in all my dates. Dated a guy once who said he thought that Ayn Rand was right about everything. That right there should have tipped me off.

[Deleted]

I read We the Living when I was in high school. Far, far too many times to be healthy.

It's basically a bodice-ripper about a fiercely intelligent and captivatingly beautiful young White Russian aristocrat and her struggles to LIVE in 1920's Soviet Russia and become an engineer. The character is a sort of gauche feminine prototype for Howard Roark and she's clearly how Rand saw herself at this time. Think Jo March in Little Women with all the filial loyalty removed and replaced by lots and lots of libido and you're a good deal of the way there. In other words, an ideal literary role model for your average self-involved, hormonal teen with intellectual pretensions.

...(sigh), boy, did I love that book.

[Deleted]

warmblankey said:

...your average self-involved, hormonal teen with intellectual pretensions.

Wow, that so sums up why I (and millions of other teenagers) go nuts over her books. It really pushes buttons for young adults who believe they're smarter than everyone else. There I was, an angst-ridden, socially inept, confused teenaged girl, yet I was Howard Roark...

I read both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead and it boggles my mind to this day that the heroine in both books is for all intents and purposes raped by the hero. And this proves to her that he's good enough for her -- that he's her equal!

I think the only reason that went over my head as a teenager was that I knew nothing about sex and couldn't differentiate between nice, happy sex and sex based on a really twisted neurosis.

[Deleted]

I know, me too, to pretty much all of the above. Hee.

In fact now that I think of it, the protagonist of WTL, Kira, largely reacts to the social and political rot in her country much like your average sulky teenager, i.e. isolating herself in a cocoon of assumed superiority and bruised sensibility, while never actually making or doing anything to justify this pose. For example, Kira's dream is to build an aluminium bridge, which never even gets to the drawingboard stage, not because it's a dumb-a** idea which is structurally impossible, but because Rand probably thought this 'ambition' had enough ballast as a metaphor for Kira's assumed iconoclasm.

Apologies for that last sentence, which apart from the word 'dumba**', was about as pretentious as I would ever want to get on a Friday afternoon dead sober.

[Deleted]

guinastasia said:

Now, I've decided to give The Fountainhead a read. I'm trying to keep an open mind, but I'm scared I'll turn into a raving Objectionist who quotes her at every turn.

Hee. I think you meant raving Objectivist, but I like yours better; it's more in keeping with the 'no one can truly understand me, I'm too unique' conceit of Rand's writing.

[batmom]

I tried to read Atlas Shrugged one summer (I needed something to read and my roommate had an Ayn Rand collection) and I got about 2/3 of the way through before abandoning it. I rarely abandon any book once I've got a ways into it, but I just couldn't take it. The book was a vehicle for an objectionable (in my opinion) philosophy wrapped in mediocre writing populated by a couple of Mary Sue characters and a wad of charicatures.

[roseland]

I read both Atlas Shrugged and The Fountainhead and it boggles my mind to this day that the heroine in both books is for all intents and purposes raped by the hero. And this proves to her that he's good enough for her -- that he's her equal!

Drove me fuckin' nuts this did. I actually liked The Fountainhead much better than Atlas Shrugged. Of course, I read Atlas Shrugged second and had had enough of the long philosophical and political lectures. There was more of a story in The Fountainhead and not as many boring lectures. We get it, Ayn, Communism sucks! The individual rules! I've always thought that Taylor Caldwell, who has a similar philosophical and political viewpoint was much better at incorporating the philosophy into her books.