atlas shrugged, or ayn rand in general Options

[brooklyneast05]

i just finished reading Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand last weekend. has anyone read it? what did you think?



i thought it was good. it's probably one of my favorite books now. it was long as hell (1,000+ pages) and wordy as hell. sometimes rand pisses me off with her writing style. she beats a point down into the dirt too often. i get sick of the characters preaching making speeches to me. prior to reading atlas, i read the fountainhead, so i somewhat expected it and was used to her writing style already.

if you haven't read it then i guess you should know that it's basically a philosophy within a story. the entire point of the story is to outline and explain her philosophy of objectivism. it does this way more thoroughly than the fountainhead did if any of you read that. the story if fiction. the situations and characters are often times extreme and unbelievable...but at the same time believable? i don't know how to explain it really. i think someone who didn't agree with her philosophy could still enjoy this book, maybe someone here who hates objectivism can say if they hated the book too.

this book has made me think a lot. it's made me rethink what i think about capitalism in general. i can't help but compare this story to what's going on in our country right now. there are a lot of parallels between current events and the events in this book. it makes you think and worry and in general feel like america is probably doomed.

whether or not i agree with objectivism is still up in the air i guess. i can't see myself ever agreeing with it 100%. however, there is more i like about it than dislike about it at this point in time.


anyway i'll stop there and we can discuss more if anyone has anything to say about it or has read it. if you haven't read atlas, but you've read something else by her then we can talk about that here too.

[JonHMChan]

I finished Atlas Shrugged about two years ago. This wasn't the first Rand book I read; I actually read The Fountainhead much earlier about four years ago. It's a good book, and a truly momentous feat on Rand's part -- but when it comes to the philosophy (I'm a philosophy student right now), Rand fails miserably. Granted, I thought I was in love with Objectivism, her ideas spoke to me like very few ever have, but when you finally look at it, get through its intricacies, you'll start to see holes.

Take a look at this article by Nathaniel Branden, someone who was very, very close to Rand when she was at the peak of her success: http://www.nathanielbranden.com/catalog/ar...nd_hazards.html