Since one of Ayn Rand's acolytes has been selected to run for Veep, this short quip should be

[madinmaryland]

remembered:

"There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs."

[MrBrooks2]

1. Have you read the book?

Just out of curiosity, have you actually read Atlas Shrugged?

[The Magistrate]

2. To save Everyone the Trouble, Sir....

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021132043


Chichiri (2,818 posts)

Atlas Shrugged: A Summary

With the renewed focus this week on the works of Paul rAyn Rand, it occurs to me that there are many DUers who have been fortunate enough to never read Rand's works. For their benefit, here is a summary of her magnum opus that I wrote some years ago. It's on the lengthy side, but believe me, it's many orders of magnitude shorter than the book itself, and you get the drift just as easily.

Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand (Random House, 1957) takes place in a universe where trucking, shipping and air freight are impractical, where hard alloys can be made of soft elements, where oil can be extracted from shale to any degree desired, where steam engines are incapable of out-pulling diesel, where gasoline does not evaporate over long periods of time, where sound waves can destroy structures hundreds of miles away without damaging the transmitter, and -- in a particularly important plot point -- where the laws of optics do not apply. It is a universe, in other words, that resembles our own so closely that the allegorical argument can easily be carried over to life in the real world.

...much, much more, and rum fun too, follows at the link...

[Kennah]

4. Welcome to DU! Enjoy your short stay. Say hi to Rush.

[Major Nikon]

8. He just stopped by for a pizza

[Kennah]

10. He must have ordered ass pizza, since that is what was handed to him.

[FSogol]

6. Yes, it is childish defense of selfishness. One of the 20th century's biggest load of bullshit.

[Tom Ripley]

7. What teenager hasn't?

[sabrina 1]

9. Never read any of her books, but I have seen several interviews with her and she seemed

like a very selfish, very disturbed individual. Creepy is the best word I can think of for her. She comes across in those interviews as someone who is not particularly bright, but is suffering from a sever form of paranoia. Today, she probably could have received some help for her condition.

What is truly amazing to me after watching a few of those interviews is that anyone ever thought she had anything worthwhile to say. There is something deeply disturbing about the fact that people like Greenspan eg, thought she was some kind of genius.

Had I ever met her, I would have suggested deep psychiatric analysis.

She didn't even believe her own hype, as evidenced by the fact that she collected SS a program that presumably should have been abhorrent to her. A complete phony, opportunist not very intelligent but smart enough to take advantage of the morons who thought she had something important to say. Unfortunately some of those fools got into positions of power in this country, ie, Greenspan and helped destroy it economically which should surprise no one considering where he got his wild, insane ideas from.

Added to all of that, her obsession with a serial killer, her 'ideal man' was just plain sick.

Watch her eyes when she is being interviewed, constantly darting around, not nomral. The poor woman need help but never got it thanks to the fools who thought she was some kind of genius. A very sad chapter in our history.

[madinmaryland]

11. Thanks for joining DU, David Brooks.

[kestrel91316]

13. I've read it 5 times, before I finally concluded that it was a POS,

abysmally poor writing, and abysmally poor philosophically.

Ayn Rand worshipped a serial killer, and her chapter about all the citizenry dying horribly in the train tunnel is her own act of mass murder because she couldn't do it for real. She just wished she could.

World's. Worst. Writer.

And world's. Worst. Person.

[Freddie]

3. That's going around FB

A teenager friend who's a LOTR nut posted it and I'm sure she has no idea it's a "gentle" jab at the wannabe veep. since she just turned 18 I'll have to explain this!

[FSogol]

5. I like Frank Conniff's take:

"I believe that a book can change your life, and apparently "Atlas Shrugged" has changed a lot of people into assholes."

[turtlerescue1]

14. So well put...thanks FSogol and Mr. Frank Conniff.

[msongs]

12. quote means nothing if you don't know what an "orc" is. nt