Atlas Shrugged
by Ayn Rand
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Book Summary Information
Author: Ayn RandEdition: Paperback
Published: 1999-08-01
ISBN: 0452011876
Number of pages: 1200
Publisher: Plume
Book Reviews of Atlas Shrugged
Book Review: She's got a bone to pick and a chip on her shoulder
Summary: 2 Stars
I started out wanting to read this book as a novel, not as a political treatise. I told myself: just because I don't like libertarianism doesn't mean Ayn Rand sucks. I told myself I'd be open-minded.
Well, the verdict is that the story is a nice enough story for about two thirds of the book, what with the collapse of the economy and the failing train system and the melodramatic hair-pulling of Dagny Taggart. There are two things that divide 'Atlas Shrugged' from good literature: the first is that the story is basically a wind-up for Galt's long monologue near the end. It (the story) contains no deeper meaning such as we look for in a text, besides Rand's repetitive Objectivist blithering. The characters, as many other reviewers note, are merely the figureheads of the two mighty ships of ideology whose clash constitutes the plot of the book, and despite the pretty paint that's on 'em they're about as interesting characters as a wooden figurehead is. Plus, it's painfully obvious where she's going with the plot. I had guessed the Big Secret of who John Galt is by page 300.
The second problem is that Rand's writing, though oozing with melodrama, is not great at all. In this age of spell-checkers and text messaging, when most impressionable youngsters will be wowed merely by Rand's ability to string grammatical sentences together with a minimum of outright infelicities, the number of positive reviews here raving about Rand's writing can hardly be surprising (though it is a bit saddening). We old-fashioned people with a healthier respect for excellent prose of depth, however, will have to look elsewhere for literary enjoyment.
Summary of Atlas Shrugged
At last, Ayn Rand's masterpiece is available to her millions of loyal readers in trade paperback.With this acclaimed work and its immortal query, "Who is John Galt?", Ayn Rand found the perfect artistic form to express her vision of existence. Atlas Shrugged made Rand not only one of the most popular novelists of the century, but one of its most influential thinkers.
Atlas Shrugged is the astounding story of a man who said that he would stop the motor of the world--and did. Tremendous in scope, breathtaking in its suspense, Atlas Shrugged stretches the boundaries further than any book you have ever read. It is a mystery, not about the murder of a man's body, but about the murder--and rebirth--of man's spirit.
* Atlas Shrugged is the "second most influential book for Americans today" after the Bible, according to a joint survey conducted by the Library of Congress and the Book of the Month Club
Who is John Galt?
This famous rhetorical question rings through Ayn Rand's best-selling novel as the people's anthem of despair in depressed economic times.
Set in the future, the novel follows capitalist magnates as they battle looters, strikers, and the impending ruin of the United States' economy. The romantic and intellectual relationship between Dagny Taggart, the heroine, and John Galt, whose identity as the leader of the strike is eventually revealed, carries the novel to its climax.
This novel, controversial when it first appeared in 1957, purports Rand's objectivist philosophy that the individual is free to pursue his or her own happiness without bowing to God or society. Objectivism in action upholds full laissez-faire capitalism as the only philosophy that can protect humankind's freedom to think, to be inventive, and to live productively.
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