Publisher: Signet Paperback

Sing it, sister!

*(Because I feel that I did­n’t have much to say about this nov­el, it has sin­gle­hand­ed­ly stalled all the reports for the books I’ve read since. So please for­give the cur­so­ry glance. There are oth­er books I actu­al­ly want to say some­thing about.)*

Ayn Rand’s novel­la *Anthem* is a quick read. By my esti­mate the book comes in around 26,000 words. 

Don’t expect char­ac­ter devel­op­ment. Not real­ly. Although the sto­ry is about a per­son dis­cov­er­ing his own per­son­hood in … Read the rest

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Greed is good (for the shoulders)

I’ve got to fin­ish list­ing all the books I read last year before I can start writ­ing about this year’s books, and this one has been a tough one to write about. I’m very deeply ambiva­lent about *Atlas Shrugged*, more so than about *[The Fountainhead]([canonical-url:2008/07/05/second-handers-news])*. *Atlas Shrugged* is Rand’s lat­er work, writ­ten and pub­lished almost a decade and a half after *The Foun­tain­head*, and the scope is far grander. What­ev­er virtues and faults can be … Read the rest

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Second-hander’s news

How things have changed since my first read­ing of *The Foun­tain­head*! I haven’t read Rand since my very ear­ly twen­ties, pos­si­bly my very late teens. I found the cen­tral theme of Rand’s work in *The Foun­tain­head* to run par­al­lel to my mat­u­ra­tion in the time between the first read­ing and today. The old­er I get, the less I care what oth­er peo­ple think.

I tend to dis­trust those who claim not to care about oth­er peo­ple’s opin­ions. It’s a facile claim, … Read the rest

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